


Kishi Kaisei

by ozsia



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Katekyou Hitman Reborn!
Genre: Blood Adoption, F/M, Harry Potter Leaves the Wizarding World, Harry Potter is Hibari Kyouya, I Don't Even Know, M/M, Snapshots, Wizarding World Bashing, Working on cliches
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-03-05
Updated: 2017-04-28
Packaged: 2018-09-28 14:04:05
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 22,499
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10111904
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ozsia/pseuds/ozsia
Summary: 'Once you drink that viral, Lord Potter -' The Goblin warns. His long, boney fingers are interlinked in front of his person and watching Harry who barely blinks at the words. 'There will be no going back.''I understand.' Harry replies needlessly, tone curt. 'Completely.'Where Harry has enough after the death of his godfather and leaves the Wizarding World behind with a new name and another set of genetics.





	1. When Words Are the Only Thing Left

**Author's Note:**

> "Kishi Kaisei" translate to: 'Wake from death and return to life". 
> 
> Posted now or it would probably remain in my files with the dust of untouched documents forever.

Lily Evens has just turned eleven-years-old when there’s a knock at the door. She’d already opened her presents, her favourite of which was a Hedwig doll she’d wanted last year but hadn’t received; a toy that was a character created by Dr Seuss. Tunie and Lily had learnt how to read with his books and she was very fond of his rhymes and the wacky, wonky world he painted in. 

Now, she’d blown out her candles on her cake and was waiting for her father to find a blunt knife to allow her to cut into the delicious sponge in front of her. Lily had been to a few birthday parties and knew that it wasn’t all that common for someone her age to be allowed to carve into the cake herself, but it’d always been the case for her family and she enjoyed doing it.

The call of a visitor stops her father short from his task. He turns to her mother with some curiosity. ‘I thought you said your lot couldn’t make it?’ he asks as he lowers the knife onto the kitchen counter top, already distracted.

Mummy simply frowned. ‘They can’t. Jeff’s sick so Rose had to stay home,’ she responds with a glance towards the hallway and the door that lays beyond. Daddy didn’t wait around to ponder the mystery, instead leaving to answer the door before the bell had a change to chine again. It left Lily and Petunia at the kitchen table, staring helplessly at the red velvet cake. Mummy was a baker and always made their cakes; every year she seemed to get better. 

The piping for the beautiful white flowers around the base was so realistic that it seemed that if Lily were to reach forward, her finger would brush against a real petal. All Lily wanted as she fidgeted was to try a piece.

Daddy returned with a woman in tow and Lily’s eyes were instantly drawn to the stranger. She was a bit younger than her parents, long dark hair pulled up into a tight bun and wearing a black blouse and tartan skirt. She was very professional looking, walked proudly, with her hands interlaced in front of her and her chin jutted forward.

Mummy seems to surprised and Daddy is quick to introduce the stranger. ‘Dear, this is - Minerva McGonagall.’ He steps aside to allow the woman more room in the entrance of the kitchen, gesturing to present her even if the confusion from his face hasn’t quick shifted. ‘She’s here about Lily-Flower’s education.’ 

‘What?’ Mummy blinks as she looks uncertainly between Daddy and the lady who curtsies.

‘It’s nice to meet you, Misses Evans,’ McGonagall says with an accent Lily hasn’t encountered before, far more used to cockney from the East London area or the RP accent, both of which were very different. 

‘Er - quite, would you like to sit down?’ Mummy asks because manners cost nothing and it’d be rude otherwise. McGonagall inclines her head and lowers herself primly into the seat Daddy pulls out, on the opposite side of the table to Lily and Tunie. 

‘Thank you.’ McGonagall nods and although Daddy comes back to sit between them, Lily is very curious about the lady; finds her intrigue piqued for more than just McGonagall’s sudden appearance. When they’re gazes meet, Lily finds the woman’s light green eyes…familiar. 

‘Ah…’ McGonagall smiles and it softens the harder edges of her stern face. ‘You must be Lily.’ 

Lily straightens and Tunie is quick to pout. ‘How’d you guess?’ 

‘Magic,’ McGonagall states without a hint of mocking in her tone. The seriousness of her voice is enough to startle her parents even when Lily’s stomach alit. ‘Because I am a witch and - so are you Lily Evans.’

That’d caused some outrage before McGonagall turns one of their empty chairs into a cat and levitates Lily in her own. The reality of the situation seems to shock near everyone silent as the grapple for footing. ‘I am sure the idea will take some getting used to, but I am here to offer you a place at Hogwarts: School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.’ 

‘A place?’ Daddy asks warily.

McGonagall. ‘It is a wonderful opportunity. We’ve had our eye on Ms Evans since she was seven.’

‘What?’ Mummy exclaims. ‘H-how -?’

‘Why, your young one has had some powerful accidental magic. Muggle-Bird’s are, of course, hard for us to find and Hogwarts is England’s most prodigious school; these are slim pickings.’

‘But you’re invested in Lily?’ Daddy says as if he needs confirmation. 

McGonagall nods. ‘Children who have repeated occasions of accidental magic are automatically bought to the attention of the Board of Governors. It’s all in accordance with the the Secrecy Act and teaching these young witch and wizards how to control their magical outbursts, however it has the added bonus of giving talented children a chance.’ 

 

* * *

 

Lily had been walking on sunshine, so excited and so desperate to look at the bright side with how tense things were at home. She wanted to belong here, to be able to say that everything with Petunia was worth it. Maybe that was why. Maybe that was why she’d been so ignorant to all the corruption and bigotry that had an almost parasitical relationship with magic. 

It isn’t until one of her best friends calls her “mudblood” that she realises how hate festers in the Wizarding World just like everywhere else, if not more as it had not been taught consequence. Lily’s grandpa would’ve been ashamed, having fought in the second World War for Britain and Europe which had been falling to it’s knees in the face of such intolerance that world may never recover from its destruction, however they try to move on. Ashamed but not surprised, as Grandpa had been a wise man, quiet but he’d inspired her nonetheless. 

It was probably with the strength he gave her that allowed Lily to refuse to be stepped on, however intimidating it seemed, to take a stand. Even if all she protected was herself. Because there were so many more pure-bloods or half-bloods than muggle-borns, with tutoring and with more understanding of the cultural that was so closed off to her. 

Severus came to Gryffindor to apologise but Lily had only responded his call because he’d become demanding and rude to the second year that had answered the knock on the portal door. Lily would have just cut him off, embarrassed enough at being proven wrong about his nature, hurt at the betrayal and disgust in herself that she’d been so blind. 

Instead, Lily forced herself meet him by the portal, the door just open enough for them to have a conversation but she would not go out to meet him and Severus was not welcome inside. He’d looked like a dog with its tail between its legs and Lily marvelled at the gall. Lily hadn’t blinked at the “sorry” he’d mumbled though his distress may have very well been genuine.

‘You think that an apology will make up for what you said?’ Lily had asked once he’d said his peace and had fallen silent, looking at her expectantly. And of course, that Severus could throw such a horrifying slur her way was terrible but that he said it at all was _worse._

“Mudblood” had been added to the Wizarding World vernacular when purebloods had started to bury those with “dirty blood” in the ages of Merlin, before the magic community had retreated from their muggle counterparts. Then it was used to further mock and degrade those who’d survived. It was a terrible thing to say to anyone, rooted in the death of an incalculable number of victims. 

Purebloods said it to people they thought beneath them, that they thought so invaluable that they didn’t deserved to life. It was an _horrendous_ word and Lily could never, ever condone it. More than that, she should’ve questioned Severus on the group he’d decided to align himself with in Slytherin, primarily Malfoy, Nott and Macnair. She knew all of them to be racists, far more than simple bullies; they’d been _dangerous,_ but she’d stupidly pushed away the warnings because she’d thought that with the amount of trouble Severus had had with Potter and his ragtag gang, that having _other_ friends besides Lily was a good thing. 

Well, birds and a feather and all that. She couldn’t turn a blind eye towards it anymore. Enough was enough. He’d shown himself for what he was.s

‘You can keep your sorries,’ Lily had told his wide eyes, dark pits that she once looked at and saw friendship in. ‘You were right as it happens: I _am_ a Mud-Blood.’ Whatever noise in the common room and been whispering behind her cut out abruptly.

‘Lily -’ he reaches out but he does not deserve her name nor her presence. Or any part of her. Lily wondered if that rich Prince blood caused clots. Wondered if it shined like _gold_ if he was to be cut open rather than the simple red iron that ran in hers. 

‘Snape.’ She narrowed her eyes, warning him off. Lily swallowed, and ignored the aching of her heart as she leaned in and summoned all the contempt inside her that had managed to build. _‘You will not_ bury _me.’_

She stepped back, arm still holding the door - always in control of this interaction and is firm in closing it in Severus’ floundering face, severing their ties with the same coldness that he had spat that word. Maybe some people would say it was callous, that it was a mistake; a slip of the tongue and that Severus needed someone. Lily was not a Hufflepuff and there had to be a line. 

No one else would give her self-worth, she had to have it within herself. 

 

* * *

 

Lily stared in shock at the _Daily Prophet,_ at the headline that announced the death of Charlus and Dorea Potter. They were the third pureblooded family to suffer a loss, the others being the Prewett’s and the Bone’s. Every murder would be described gruesomely with an almost sadistic flourish. Lily hated this paper, it was a perverse form of journalism but it was the only way to keep track of the war, to gauge the climate. 

The rise of a new Dark Lord meant people were dying. At the beginning it had been attacks in muggle areas and although those hadn’t stopped, they seemed to have moved closer inward, to the muggleborns and half-bloods that had already invaded. Lily’s own life had been threatened in the corridors and classrooms and she was never far from her wand, or a friend whom she knew she could trust. 

Many were dying these days. That, however was no excuse for Potter to learn of his Parents’ passing from _Aron Sigmund, “war correspondent”._ The aurors as stretched thin as they were, would know of their deaths, they should have sent someone to inform him, as their immediate kin, their only child.

Lily hadn’t been very far from where Potter sat on the bench as one of her closet friend’s was Alice Alwyn, who’d recently agreed to a courtship with Frank Longbottom, a member of Gryffindor’s Quidditch team and seemed not to mind Potter’s company. It had the effort of seating her on the opposite side of the table and it’d made her saw the moment he’d clapped eyes on the front page of the paper delivered through Hogwart’s subscription. 

The graphic photos of Potter’s parents - the Potter’s who’d used their voices to be outspoken about amoral actions of the new Dark Lord and his party, was set as an example the _Daily Prophet_ hadn’t minded sharing. **You-Know-Who Deals Another Blow To The Light!** just added to the effect. 

The photos of Charles - early forties maybe, tortured bloody and missing a limb with his wife - Dorea’s who was missing a lot more, was almost too much for Lily to even look at for a second though she’d become almost desensitised from it, but it takes less than for Potter to go absolutely white. The paper falls from his hands and it’s like the whole Hall has held its breath. Lily cannot help but gawk, unsure - if anything - what she should do. 

Hazel eyes are wide and are almost vacant as they gaze at the table where the article detailing his parents’ murder glares up at him. The noise Potter makes as it seems to settle in is something Lily cannot describe and she acts instinctively. 

The rest of his gang aren’t here as the full moon had just been and gone, with Remus recovering in the Hospital Wing. Black had managed to get detention though this time Lily was sure it hadn’t been his fault - not at that time of the month, as they had the good grace not to look for trouble. Pettigrew had the bad habit of sleeping late the next day, with Potter and Black when he was available the only two who managed to be functional after. 

This morning it was just Potter and a silent Hall of people frozen stiff with shock. No one deserves this and Lily cannot stop herself from jumping up onto the table, ignorant of the food that was along its service. She knocks over three glasses and a pitcher of pumpkin juice but refuses to flinch away, even when her knee lands in a dish of fried egg and the other is scrapped by something sharp, possibly a knife. 

Lily barely notices as her heart pounds with anxiety even when she flings her right hand to push everything away from in front of Potter. The paper, his plate, a mug and a trey of hash browns straight into Longbottom’s lap. Lily cannot even offer an apologetic look as after she throws her arms around Potter’s quivering shoulders.

Her position is inappropriate, not just because her arse is in the air but that she is touching a boy she was not involved with. Her mother would be horrified but Potter is - he’s _trembling._ His gasping breath heats under her collar and he stifles a sob, two before his own arms hesitantly curl around Lily’s back.

Potter had always been so _proud_ of his parents and not in the egotistical way Malfoy could be, but as a loving son. He hadn’t ever lorded over his status in the Wizarding World, brought about by birth alone. No, he took pride in who is parents were, rather than _what._ He’d always been delight the stance Charlus and Dorea had taken in the war; the words they had spoken for the many victimised, the battles fought in protection and now…

Lily pushes closer, _harder,_ and Potter does the same, strengthens himself until she can feel his nails digging into her shoulders through her robes. Potter cries. It’s hushed and stifled, strangled because though there is so much space in the Hall, this is not a safe space. Lily tries to shield him as best as she can; knows that this would be humiliating however justified, however _human._ There was vulnerability here, weakness that could be exploited and her heart rages at the injustice. 

Someone softly clears their throat, a nudge for attention that is unintrusive. Lily looks up to see Headmaster Dumbledore and his regretful eyes behind his half-moon spectacles. Besides him is Professional McGonagall who seems shaken, grey with a misting gaze. 

‘Mister Potter…’ Dumbledore begins before he stops. Potter doesn’t so much as twitch against Lily, his face still buried in the nook of her neck. The headmaster readdresses to her, expression grim. ‘Pardon, Miss Evans. Would…you mind ever so, if you were to escort Mister Potter to my office?’ 

Lily wordlessly agrees and tries to shift backwards, to get off of the the tabletop in order to stand, only Potter refuses to let go, doesn’t budge and her stomach tightens uncomfortably. Swallowing, she instead moves forward and Alice and Longbottom are quick to take things from her path. It’s still awkward and her right foot gets caught up in her skirt at one point as she sits, trying to get her legs up underneath her and has to fix it without untying her arms from Potter’s shoulders.

Eventually she’s in a position where she can simply shift into Potter’s lap and the tight space between the edge of the table and the situation of the bench is tight, enough so that Lily has to wince but her shift has already begun to wet with his tears. Lily cannot begrudge this.

‘I’m…I’m not going anywhere,’ Lily says when neither of them moves, waiting as she is to feel him start to stand. The professors are thankfully patient otherwise they’d be losing house points for what would no doubt come out of her mouth. ‘I’m coming with you, but…you need to get up, can you do that?’ she asks gently. 

Lily starts to rub the path of his spine and wishes she could just make this better, just make the hurt go away. All the magic couldn’t accomplish that though, there were rules. Death was final, life was singular and precious and only eternal once it was gone. ‘I won’t leave you,’ she swears again and hears how her own voice has become thick and weighted in a grief she has no right to. ‘I _promise,_ but we need to stand.’ 

Potter shudders than and slowly, he nods. It’s so small she wouldn’t have recognised it if she hadn’t felt it. A moment later, together, they manoeuvre up in a way that Potter can keep Lily close and separate themselves from the bench and table. She tries to ignore her discomfort because this wasn’t about her and the last thing running through this boy’s head would be anything improper. 

He lifts his head, eyes half-mast with tears clinging to dark lashes like icicles forming in the winter. His face is a mess and his glasses are askew. He stares at her with such heartbreak that she feels her own groan in sympathy, echoing in the tight cavity of her chest. ‘The headmaster’s office,’ she reminds him, gently giving him something else to focus on as she feels the professionals behind her. 

Potter blinks at her, breathing in and out through his mouth and her stomach jumps as she starts to fear that he’s going into shock but then he wraps an arm around her waist. His fingers tangle themselves up in Lily’s robes and she takes a breath. _Okay_. They begin to leave the Great Hall and she tries not to think about what she’s left behind, the newspaper article and months worth of gossip and ridicule, she's tries not to think about how her legs are shaking, how blood is trailing down into her sock from that roody knife.

Instead, Lily tries to anchor herself to Potter, to this boy and how he stumbles, like his legs have lost their way, like he no longer has the foundations to keep him walking. She tries to focus and bear his weight. 

Lily, after all, had given Potter her word and she’d be damned if she did not keep it.

 

* * *

 

Lily’s been dating James seriously for six months after learning of the gentleman underneath all that bluster, after gaining an understanding for everyone of his confrontations with Severus which had been her one major hangup on his character and that his interest in her was genuine and heartfelt. He wasn’t perfect but he always endeavoured to be better. That the word mudblood had never left his mouth was a boon, that he hated pureblood superiority was another. She knew that no matter what, she’d be safe with him. 

Some may say it was a tad early but they moved into a house of their own; a cottage in Godric’s Hollow. They lived in a war and life was short and love was the only thing that people seemed to be able to give nowadays. 

Their home was not as lavish as Potter Mansion but James wasn’t able to spend any length of time there. Lily had thought that was incredibly sad; it was his ancestral home and he’d grown up there but Lily couldn’t fault him, understandable as it was to struggle with the loss of not one but both parents.

Their cottage was lovely, it was _theirs._ Of course, though James had tried to be considerate of Lily in regards to his friends and how much time they got to spend there but she knew how important they were to him, and had had no issue in making the guest bedroom Sirius’. Remus was too proud to live them and Peter had a home of his own but Sirius needed somewhere. 

It helped that she had become quite fond of the man herself and that there were safety in numbers. It was a dangerous time and with the failure in the Ministry to put a stop to the Dark Lord and his associates, the Order of the Phoenix had risen to the occasion.

When they weren’t fighting blood superiority, they were working. James and Sirius were auror partners while Lily worked on her Charms Mastery. She wasn’t entirely sure what she wanted to do with it yet, just that she knew she was going in the right direction in her elected branch of magic. 

 Things were - hectic. may be a word, terrifying another. Sometimes Lily needed space and left James feeling insecure. Other instances James took a joke or a prank too far but they learnt one another’s boundaries; the lines that they needed to have drawn, the ones they could compromise on because that’s what it meant when you loved someone. 

And Lily did love him so after a nice dinner in when James got down on one knee in front of her, box in hand that seated a glittering ring set in velvet, Lily wasn’t sure what to think. Her chest fluttered with something like hope as she looked into Jame’s loving eyes, smiling crookedly like but she existed.

(And she remembered, on that first visit home with James, before her own parents had been caught up in a “gas explosion” what her mother had whispered to her while Dad teased James with the television. ‘I like the way he looks at you,’ she’d said, approval in the lines of her tired face.) 

Swallowing in nervous excitement, the spice of the curry on her tongue, Lily knew she had to ask. ‘Is this….’ she took a breath. ‘This isn’t a joke, is it, James?’ 

James smile softens, shaking his head sheepishly even if the jerks are anxious in a way Lily hadn’t quite seen before. His reply, sincere and hopeful guarantees her own. 

‘I’ve always been serious about you, Lily.’ 

 

* * *

 

Lily is nineteen-years-old and her stomach is barely swollen when she discovers she is carrying another life inside her. James and her are both sat at the kitchen table, the healer having left a short while ago. They are both silent, both mourning. Ordinarily this would have been joyous news but instead it is weighed down with the fear that Lily - never mind the child - may not survive this war.

Lily is a prime target to Voldemort and his Death Eaters - a _favourite_ target. She’s desirable , a head in her field of study and married to a pureblood; all things they feel she does not deserve, that she was strong dueller and activity fought against their regime made her future very uncertain in the face of the number who wanted her dead. 

She’d been fighting with this vulnerable life in her stomach. Lily had taken missions for the Order and on three separate occasions with James, a couple with Sirius and Remus by her sides, she’d come face-to-face with Voldemort, himself. Lily had taken stupid risks, put her health on the line thinking it had been her own and -

It hadn’t been.

Lily had waved away the signs, thought the morning sickness was from the uncertainty, the fatigue from the battles and the injuries and the constant struggle but James had worried, had asked that she have a checkup. With how worn-down James was, she couldn’t refuse him. Discovering the developing baby was horrifying. How many times has she almost sentenced this child to death? How many times had she almost damned her own?

‘What do we do?’ Lily whispered knowing that she was one of the few witches on the front lines; one of their best. She knew it would be a huge blow to their cause if they were to lose, but Lily had never considered abortion before beyond the right for someone to chose. She didn’t know if she had that in her. The thought of it alone - Lily had no idea if she could live with herself afterwards…

‘My…’ James’ voice broke. His eyes were shiny, a wet shield of tears. ‘My parents…Dad said once that they had given upon children after a few years of trying. Mum - she’d been heartbroken, thought it’d been her fault. But then, they were pregnant. It’d been - they said it’d been a miracle.’ 

James couldn’t really spoke of his parents. He loved them dearly and missed them just as much. It was just something he couldn’t get over, however much having Lily and Sirius with him helped but it was very much like slapping a bandaid over a wound that refused to heal. Sadly, Lily now knew what it was like.

She could offer little though but her hand and her ear. She listens, interlinks their fingers and tries to be the pillar of support he’d been to her with the bigotry she had to deal with, Her own sister’s bitter hatred, her parent’s deaths and Snape’s continuing letters.

‘Babies aren’t born when they’re told, Dad joked,’ James murmurs thickly, while being strong enough to allow her to see his tears but stubborn enough to keep them from falling. ‘I… in the end, you get the finally say, ‘course, but…I can’t…’ 

Lily looks at him and wets her lips as her heart thumps against her rib cage and thinks wildly for a moment if it’s hers at all. ‘We’ll have to look at protections, wards,’ Lily offers, an acceptance for the decision they both seemed to have come to. There’s a trembling smile, shared trepidation as they eventual stand, together, and lead themselves up the stairs to their room. 

They settle on their bed, under plush duvets with Jame’s head cushioned against her stomach, arms laid limply on her hips. Lily in turn curls around him, feeds her hands into his impossible hair. In the shadows and the quiet, they surrender to each other.

 

* * *

 

Born as the seventh month dies under the fire of the sun, Harry James Potter’s first cry was a wailing symphony of air and life and magic. He weighed little more than a bag of sugar with frail limbs and think skin. Even so, the world had been waiting for him; Harry with his pitch black hair and bright green eyes, who took equal parts from mother and father. Harry with a heart that beat and bled with the strength that had been foretold to rival darkness.

A monster of his own making.

Lily had named him after her Grandpa, Harrison Evans; a solider who’d been a capable man with the heart of gold, a conscientious objector who’d refused to kill. Someone who’d saved several of his friends under fire despite it all. He should have died but he’d lived and that was all Lily really wanted for Harry.

Labour had been long and harsh, complicated through their living conditions and unable to go to St Mungo’s. Poppy had had to come to them, a medi-witch who was really the equivalent of a nurse but she was the only one they trusted and they’d rather risk it than allow an unknown into their space, to their baby.

‘Congratulations,’ Poppy told them as she handed Harry back after checking his vitals, cleaning him up and wrapping him in a starry blanket. Her eyes were dim and her thin smile was forced upon her mouth but the new parents could hardly blame her. The war was terrible time for everyone but healers especially. A single birth would be a blessing even if itwas overwrought with the bittersweet knowledge that age protected no one.

Lily didn’t want to think of that though, the first time she held her son. Instead, she marvelled at the little light in her arms as James held her close and Sirius looked on. ‘He’s…’ James falters, breath catching in his throat as he gets a good look at their baby over her shoulder. ‘He’s beautiful.’

Lily nods in agreement as she stretches her neck to the side while ignoring the discomfort the pain potion can’t quite mask, to kiss James on the cheek. ‘Thank you,’ she whispers with no explanation, knowing he would understand.

James swallows thickly, eyes red and glazed as he looks between her and their baby. He squeezes her a little tighter and her mind flashes back to the Great Hall, to that one decision which probably changed the direction of her life. He whispers back an “I’m sorry.”

And Lily understands, too.

 

* * *

 

‘Peter,’ Lily calls after the man, before he can leave. Out of all James’ friends, she knew him the least, close as she was to Remus and as much as she loved Sirius, Peter was always coming and going. He was sort of like that fair-weathered friend who was never that involved but who was never fully gone either. That type of wishy washy-ness didn’t endear Peter to Lily, but now, with what he’d agreed to do for them…

Lily trusted her idiot husband and his idiot pseudo-brother and Sirius had suggested Peter to replace him as their Secret Keeper, because it’d be less obvious, be safer with Peter going into hiding. It was, it was a good idea but would Peter be able to do what Sirius would to keep them safe? To ensure that the Secret was never spoken?

Peter turns, close to the door to address her. He wasn’t a particularly attractive man but he smiles something strained as she tries to lessen the gap between them. ‘Lily,’ he acknowledges, tone shy almost stuttering. Lily silently wondered ho the survived with his strongest friends such formidable men. ‘I-I was just on my way out…’ 

The Fidelius Charm had been cast, and the last of their protections were in place. Still, Lily stares at him and how he can’t quite meet her eye as he shifts from one leg to another. ‘You’ll keep him safe, won’t you?’ she asks as James and Lily could look after themselves. They are not at as much risk but their son - their son who couldn’t yet wield his wand or call upon his magic to help him would be in danger until this war was over. 

‘Of course I will,’ Peter responds and Lily tries to nod in gratitude but she can’t help the anxiety even as she says goodbye. 

 

* * *

 

‘Harry…be safe,’ she whispered to the winds, a prayer to anything that could hear. ‘Be strong.’

They will be her last words to her son, words that Lily hopes beyond hope could somehow reach him; a plea, a desperate appeal to the world on behalf of her baby who’d been born tangled in Fate’s marionette strings. She cursed the prophecy, self-filling though it was, that had painted an even larger target on their backs.

It was too late now. In a fit of complacency neither James nor she had their wands on their person, too much time off the front lines lulling them into a false sense of security. It had brought Lily to her knees in front of Harry, whom she had placed in his crib while whispering words she hopes he’ll remember, internalise.

The barricade against the door wouldn’t last, and she knew like she knew that James would die - would already _be_ dead, that she was soon to follow. _‘Take him and run!’_ he’d said, like he didn’t know he didn’t have a wand. James and put Harry into her arms and forced her to move. Neither of them had been able to say goodbye but that was okay.

It was okay because they’d see each other again, after Harry was safe.

It was why James had sacrificed himself, why Lily had run with her heart in her arms and her life in her eyes. Depositing Harry into his Charmed crib, Lily just hoped it would be enough for their last resort. 

Lily gazes into her son’s eyes and it’s like looking into a mirror that shows her where she has been. She gazes at him and tries not to cry as she whispers words she wishes to imprint onto his very skin, so that during times she will not be there for - for all the things they will miss and be unable to share, he shall only have to look at his own flesh to know where he came from.

Time is always short when it’s running out and Lily wants Harry to know between trying to fit an entire lifetime of _I love you’s_ in mere moments that living is hard but it is so, _so_ worth it. That there would be misgivings but a thousand blessings to make up for it.

She wants to be able to tell him that hate is heavy and that it its a burden that she doesn’t want him to carry, that love is hard to find sometimes but its value is beyond compare. Lily needs to be able to teach Harry that fighting is difficult but there were some battles he wouldn’t be able to run away from, that there were some wars that he would have to pick a side to. 

But _I love you_ is all Lily can manage; is all she is able to give as the door is blasted open. The wood splinters and rans around them like the very house is mourning the inevitable. Tears sting her own eyes as she looks the murder who had just murdered her husband, the man who’d waited for her, the man who’d given her a beautiful baby boy. 

A murderer who’d given everything up, who’d destroyed everything he was and could have been, a coward who’d run away from their reality; from their mortality. A Dark Lord who had made his life so incredibly small. 

Lily had never completely seen eye-to-eye with Dumbledore, maybe she was just too _muggle,_ but one of the truest things he’d ever said was Voldemort’s beginning. Lily thinks as she stands, Harry at her back, that this could have been prevented.

If there was just little less bigotry, a little more acceptance she would be here to see Harry get his first Hogwarts’ letter. Lily might’ve been able to experience his first trial and error with a broom. She could have met his first friends, teased him on his first crush. She could have congratulated him on his grades or helped tutor him. Lily would have been able to welcome his partner into her home, be able to meet his own blessed children should he have any. Lily would have been able to experience all life’s ups and downs with him. 

But if wishes were horses, beggars would ride and that was a fantasy. Here and now, the only thing Lily can do to ensure Harry’s survival is to give up her own. She would do it without regret because she was his mother. She would do it.

In front of cold, uncaring red eyes, Lily begins to beg, knowing already that he would not see through her. That they forget she is more than just a pretty face despite her accomplishments.They forget that her being a muggleborn - a _mudblood -_ doesn’t make her any less of a Charms prodigy. 

Her own on the the runs on the ceiling and under the carpet had been a secret told unto no one but her husband who would be lying dead downstairs, alone like she was now. Runes she activities as she refuses to move out of the way like Voldemort demands. It’s elder magic; Dark, something she’d picked up in one of the books Sirius had given her. 

Magic required balance in all things: a life for a life and Lily had no problem with giving Harry what was left of her’s. 

Harry will live. 

She had made sure of it.


	2. Half and In-Between

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, this was really hard to write. Once I started I couldn’t stop. It's now 5 am. I hope someone likes this otherwise, I might be the one in hysterics. 
> 
> Edit: now proofread. I hope.

Sirius Black met his family on the train to Hogwarts. His mother had been furious that their heir had had to use a cursed “mudblood contraption” in order to reach the school. She’d owled the headmaster demanding that Sirius be able to Portkey in, instead and she’d been spitting mad when the man had refused. 

Sirius had been fascinated with the “steam train” and was quick to find himself an empty compartment and to distance himself from his mother and father after a tense bout of goodbyes. He’d moved slowly, carefully handling his trunk onto the train because he was still smarting from a hex that his mother had sent his way for his cheek this morning.

He was struggling into his robes when the compartment door opened, which exposed his back to a pair of round hazel eyes. Sirius froze, his arms spasms in the sleeves he had just pulled them through as his toes curled into his shoes. He didn’t move until the owner of those eyes blinked and pushed someone Sirius hadn’t even _noticed,_ back out again. ‘Hold on, Peter,’ the boy mutters as he loses the door shut.

Scrambling, Sirius hurried into his shirt. _I shouldn’t have been lazy,_ he berates himself, knowing that he should have undone the buttons like Regulus is always telling him to, instead of just pulling it over his head. His parents’ had already left their marks in the silvery scars engraved into the pale of his back, but he didn’t need anyone seeing them. 

Sirius is strangling himself with his tie when there is a knock at the carriage door, it was strong, firm but not frightening like his father’s when the man was in a rage. (His mother didn’t knock at all, would force herself into his space like she had a right to be there). Sirius’ breath catches in his throat and he waits for a second, wonder if they’ll just leave if he is silent for long enough but. Eventually, he calls out an almost timid “come in”.

Hazel eyes return and so does the boy at his back. For amount they both stare at each other, Sirius in apprehension (because people aren’t _meant_ to see and he’s a _Black_ and he knows what that means. They’re known for their insanity, their cruelty, he hears the whispers and he knows,) and Hazel Eyes with - something else entirely. 

Hazel Eyes must be the same age as Sirius, wearing glasses which are sat crooked on his nose, like he woke up in a rush. His hair was almost as dark as Sirius’ own and is so impossibly untidy it speaks of an even bigger hurry. He’s in the Hogwarts’ slacks and button up though his tie is nowhere to be seen and his robes were thrown over his arm haphazardly.

The boy was straight-backed though, had this sort of effortless confidence as Hazel Eyes raises his hand in greeting. ‘Yo,’ he says like he doesn’t know, like he hadn’t _seen._ ‘Mind if we sit here?’

_Why? What do you want?_ is on the tip of Sirius’ tongue but he ends up nodding numbly instead. He watches in shock as Hazel Eyes inclines his head in thanks and drags his friend inside to sit on the opposite side of Sirius. 

The friend is almost a head shorter than Hazel Eyes, plumper, with a more overall face. His hair is lighter but not his eyes, and he has an almost nervous disposition as he glances around the compartment. 

It takes until Hazel Eyes eyebrow disappearing under the hectic mess of his fringe, and a laugh of ‘are you going to stand all the way? Mam said it takes _hours,’_ for Sirius to collapse back into his own seat.

It doesn’t take long for Hazel Eyes to introduce himself, afterwards. ‘I’m James, by the way.’ He grins crookedly as he leans forward, offering his hand to Sirius. ‘James Potter. This here’s Peter Pettigrew.’ 

The name resounds in Sirius’ head and his eyes widen. A Potter - the Potters were a Light family of good standing, a vague relation that Sirius hadn’t been allowed near due to their orientation. Mother would always hiss about them when they were mentioned; sneer about how they were blood traitors, would say how Aunt Dorea had disgraced herself by marrying that “toerag”. But then, the Blacks were Dark, everyone knew that. It was branded into their very colouring.

Sirius didn’t hide it any better than his father did. Potter should have been able to recognise him and if he did then why was he talking to Sirius? Why was he sat here? _Why -?_

‘- Peter’s a bit shy, don’t mind him. We’ve been friends since we were kids since he lives near the manor, his family. It’s great but it’ll be brilliant to finally meet other people,’ Potter was saying, mouth going a mile a minute with such an open expression that Sirius didn’t know _what to do._

‘I’m a Black,’ Sirius blurts out in a fit of incredulity or maybe just to make this strangeness stop, or things to make _sense_ again. He knew what Light families thought of Blacks and he wasn’t any different. They looked at him like he was filthy. (And the Dark hated him just as much, because he could never quite live up to their expectations, no matter how hard he had tried. They hurt, too, they _hurt.)_

Potter just blinks. ‘Cool,’ he responds, like the distinction didn’t matter but then he’s shimming his wand out of his pocket and Sirius can’t help in the way he tenses. His fingers curl around it with a familiarity that Sirius recognises. The Potter’s must also have had him with a practise wand before substituting it with a proper once it was time. ‘Mahogany, eleven inches. Pliable with a dragon heartstring core.’

Potter then elbows Pettigrew who shifts nervously, eyes flickering to Sirius and then back down to his knees before grimacing. He straightens with a smile with some encouragement it’s not quite right. ‘Chestnut. 9 1/4 inches. Brittle with a dragon heartstring.’ 

Potter grins before turning back to Sirius with expectant eyes and Sirius’ heart freezes a second time. It was rude for anyone to ask after someone’s wand. You just _didn’t_ and yet, his mouth complies. ‘Aspen, 12 and a half inches. Quite frigid with - a unicorn hair.’ His wand burns in his pocket as Pettigrew’s eyes widen. Potter doesn’t even the decency to look surprised, just pauses for a moment before his faces does this thing that makes it look squishy.

He wasn’t lying, though. The ivory wand (‘White!’ his mother had screamed in outrage while Ollivander looked on, deeply unimpressed with her, _‘he’s picked a white wand!’_ ) was his. _‘Good for duelling that.’_ Ollivander had stated while his mother seethed, screaming to his father’s dead eyes. The older man had glanced at his parents before leaning over the counter, causing Sirius to look up from the wand that was sparking, shivering with his magic and warm in his palm.

_‘That wood’s good for the determined; the strong-minded who like their adventures and - who know, Heir Black, they’re even known to favour the rebels at heart. The revolutionaries…keep that in mind when you remember you have bonded with a unicorn hair.’_

His mother hadn’t heard that bit, too caught up in herself but she had still almost not bought his wand. If not for Ollivander insisting that the wand chooses the wizard and picking again - if another even chose Sirius - would never work as well his mother probably would have forced another more "appropriate" wand on him.

But then Potter was smiling. It looked different from his grins somehow. ‘I’m not surprised,’ the boy tells Sirius. 

_Not surprised?_

Sirius shakes his head. ‘I’m a -’

‘Theres something _different_ about you, I can tell,’ Potter says, tapping his glasses with his index finger as he stares at Sirius. ‘Let’s be different together.’

Something in Sirius breaks a little.

(He never quite figures out it was the barriers he’s had up for so long.)

* * *

It doesn’t take long from there. The train ride is all too short as Sirius starts to talk. Even Lupin who’d started with reading a book almost as wide as his head when he had first come in, seemed both slow to interact and shy. Now he was slowly starting to join in as Potter talked.

And Lupin obviously had a story too. He was another Half-Blood who had joined them half-way through the journey; seemed to have been kicked out a few other compartments with light brown hair and even lighter green eyes. The scars which were shredded through his face, that few creatures could make told stories, Potter didn’t seem to care.

However long the train ride was, it wasn’t long enough. 

Because Sirius knew, at least, where Potter would end up. (Lupin, was maybe a Ravenclaw, he had figured from the book alone. Pettigrew…Pettigrew he honestly couldn’t hazard a guess towards.) It would be where everything bold and brave belonged.

Sirius knew that from when Potter had walked back into the compartment, had sat down where three others throughout the journey, at one look at Sirius (at recognising a Black) and had turned back around, that he would be a Gryffindor. 

Maybe that - maybe that was why after a boat ride and a speech and a song that didn’t really explain anything. That Sirius chose. That Sirius chose something different.

‘Hmm…let’s see. Quite a bit about you, now isn’t there, Heir Black?’ the Hat said once it had been placed over his head but Sirius was barely listening with his hands fisted in his lap and his heart beating out of his chest. ‘Oh! Look at this mind. Plenty of cunning in you, isn’t there? I’m never quite sure if Blacks are simply wily by nature or if you have to grow like that but….now what's this?’

_‘I want Gryffindor,’_ Sirius thinks as he bites his lip until he tastes copper. _‘I want to be a -’_

‘Oh?’ The Hat hums. ‘Now isn’t that interesting. Gryffindor? Wouldn’t that be difficult? That isn’t something to say mildly, Heir Black. It could make for quite an uncomfortable Hogwarts experience for you.’ 

Blacks’ had always been Slytherin. Sirius was _meant_ to be Slytherin. 

Sirius didn’t care.

People would think what they would. They always did and it's not like his parents could get any worse.

_‘I see,’_ The hat says suddenly after a silence. _‘Being brave isn’t the absence of fear. Being brave is having that fear but finding a way through. Choosing to be brave is still bravery and takes more strength than someone who inherently is. Remember that, Heir Black, as life’s struggles, find you. Do not let this new found courage desert you.’_

The Hat calls “GRYFFINDOR” out into a hall quietly muttering in confusion. Sirius is both elated and terrified. His mind hovers between the panic of “ _what have I done?”_ To: “ _I did it”_ and back again as McGonagall takes the Hat off. He barely registers her shocked face as the hems of his robes turn red and a lion transforms from the Hogwarts crest, which settles over his heart.

He struggles to make it to the Gryffindor table with his shaking legs. Sirius can hear every step with how silent it has gotten until -

_'WHOOO!_ Way ta go, Sirius!’ James screams through a cheer, clapping his hands ecstatically as he jumps on the spot in the as he waits to be sorted. Sirius looks over and a smile blooms across his face. It feels odd. He doesn’t know when the last time he smiled was, maybe when he was told his mother was pregnant; back when he thought that having a sibling would matter; would change anything. His mother says it’s a weak expression. He finds himself caring about that a little less as he waves back like an idiot and finds a seat near the end of the bench. 

Sirius ignores the way a few shuffle away from him until only a redhead was left. She looked at the others who had moved before putting her nose in the air like she had smelt something foul. Carrying her plate over, the girl shifts into the placement next to Sirius' before making a point to introduce herself. ‘Lily Evans,’ she introduces, offering her hand and right away he knew that she was a Muggleborn.

He took her hand with something of a relish and shook it like he never had before. Sirius only let go after he turned her small hand over and gently kissed the back. ‘Sirius Black,’ he responds back to her red cheeks and many wide-eyed stares.

It was worth it.

(And not years later, would Sirius regret that decision.)

* * *

Sirius finds he likes to laugh. James makes that possible, helps him see all a human can be. He makes friend’s with Pettigrew who grows less wary of him and Lupin, who (regardless of books, whatever their size or quantity he reads) was also sorted into Gryffindor.

He has friends, people who care. People who help him with his homework or his way off the pitch after taking a nasty fall from his broom. People who berate anyone who calls him a snake, who don’t let him join in or move away from him when he's close. They're people who try their best with his scars and things he doesn’t like to talk about. 

It's why, when a boy near the back of Potion class throws an ingredient into James’ and Remus’ potion that Sirius all but _loses his mind_. The Black “madness” was not lost on him. There was a reason why near everyone knew about it. It was the only way to explain how he snapped when he saw it explode in their faces, mouth still opening to yell out a warning as the scorching potion bursts over the two who barely have time to flinch back.

Sirius sees it happen from his desk behind them, Peter just turned towards him to ask a question or some such. (Peter wasn’t - well, he wasn’t very good at Potions. It just wasn’t his thing. Herbology was his best subject.) Sirius was giving his current goo a quarter stir when his eyes catch a movement from the opposite side of the class.

_Snape,_ his mind sizzles. It’s midway through their third year and they didn’t have much of a problem with the guy other than _his_ problem with James’ growing crush on Evans (and oh, _Merlin_ , did that boy ever have it bad). A spitfire redhead with the most unusual green eyes Sirius had ever seen. She was great at Charms and just about everything else, with a wit so sharp you could cut yourself on it if you weren’t careful. There was a kindness in her that you just didn’t see often, that only fools would take for weakness. She was tenacious and stubborn and never afraid to speak her mind.

Her auburn hair had always caught James’ eye. Sirius knew he liked to stare at her A lot of them did, but his feelings didn’t develop until he caught her Hexing Malfoy, who had just degraded her and another. Evans was clever and knew that with the small-time, hard to detect Spell she had cast would be too high a price for Malfoy to tell anyone about. Evans had earnt Malfoy’s eternal hatred that day which seemed only equal to James’ eternal devotion. 

It was to a point where people had started to notice. Sure, Sirius teased but housemates were snickering, teachers were grinning knowingly and James was embarrassed to all Avalon and back. Snape - Snape who was stuck to Evans like a bad disease despite being a Slytherin and having friends who actively _hated_ her and everyone who shared her blood, had taken to very obviously, very obsessively staring at James who tried to get to know his “friend”.

Sirius had noticed it because he recognised that type of behaviour - smelt the danger - knew that, that would just simmer. And now - 

Now their professor was rushing to James and Remus who were splattered with undone, sabotaged potion. Their skin was red and blistering, more so James than Remus but their screams were equally pained.

Sirius was used to that. He was used to listening to someone hurt whether it be his or someone else’s, but he had thought that that had been the worst of it until they started to fit. 

Sirius’ vision tunnelled and he watches numbly with Peter’s nails digging into his arm as his friends twitched and jerked on the floor. It wasn’t until someone went sprinting out of the class and returned with Madam Pomfrey that James and Remus were being levitated back out, presumably to the Hospital Wing.

Everyone else was starting to settle but Sirius was anything but calm.A howl left him, it rattled in his throat; must have sounded like a beast's roar as Peter jerked away and sent Bones back into another table’s potion but all he could see was a small smile on an ugly, cruel, _conniving_ face and then all thought was lost to him. 

He pounced over the work table and attacked Snape like a muggle. Punched the hideous, hateful boy in the face until it was gushing _redredredred_. Hit until something in his hand cracked and he was being pulled away - _away - away_ and through his snarls, there was a whispered word before all was lost to darkness. 

He woke up in the Hospital Wing with a detention from there to forever, a broken hand, scratches on his face courtesy of Snape and a very unimpressed Head of House watching him. Sirius didn’t excuse himself, didn’t attempt to explain. He bore every punishment McGonagall set (since apparently, no one else had seen Snape throw whatever the fuck it had been - and that break to his sanity was considered just that. Because _of course, that situation had been stressful, two of his best friends has been injured and he was a Black, wasn’t he?_ ) He listened to it all. Heard every word McGonagall did and didn’t say. 

He listened and poison festered in his heart. Sirius would remember this, he would remember what Snape did. Forgetting would be impossible, forgiving even more so. McGonagall’s attitude; her assumptions were noted.

(It would be the start and end of everything.)

* * *

He and James knew the secret Remus was keeping before they were ever told. They were Purebloods from very old families, so it wasn’t much of a stretch with all they were taught growing up that they figured it out but Sirius still appreciated Remus confiding in them. Even if it was after a very long wait and in some abandoned corner of a cafe in Muggle London (because who says a Hogsmeade weekend had to say, _stay_ in Hogsmeade?).

Remus was shifty, fiddling with his fingers in his lap. He was refusing to look at them as he stared down at the Muggle money he had pulled from his pocket in preparation to pay. None of them but Remus would have anything but Gallons, though they had talked about converting some - _digressing!_ Remus really had taken awhile to work up the courage to speak.

‘So…I - I suppose you’ve noticed that I - I sleep a lot,’ Remus began, his cheekbones flushed with shame which highlighted the scars that went through one side of his face. 

Sirius nodded and knew his two friends were doing the same. Remus napped quite a bit; could fall asleep anywhere so much that they had learnt that one Summoning Spell early, so that they weren’t carrying around blankets, which had been a thing for awhile. 

‘And that I get…sick,’ Remus attempted to continue.

They nod again and Sirius knows to keep his mouth shut because this is simply something Remus needs to say himself. Even if Sirius’ friend did look he was about to face a dementor with nothing but a rusty spork.

‘I’m -’ Remus begins before stopping again. His eyes dart up to look at each of them before they snap to the cafe and the muggles who were staring at them like they were something queer. ‘I’m a werewolf.’ 

_Finally_ , Sirius think as he closes his eyes while a tired smile spreads across his lips.

* * *

‘Evans,’ Sirius calls out to her.

Lily turns in her seat after a brief pause before giving him a spiteful look. For whatever reason, she was sticking by Snape despite his pitch black heart. It almost spoke credit to her if she wasn’t completely blinded by him. Lily only saw their retaliation to Snape and never Snape’s actions against them. It didn't make them perfect - Sirius would do worse - but it didn't make Snape better either.

(And with his mother’s _darling_ Dark Lord raising the death count from a few missing and a bit of destruction in Muggle cities, James grew more and more desperate to get Lily away from Snape before he could ruin her.)

‘What.’ Her voice is sharp and there is a warning in that word but Sirius ignores it. He was on a mission and he needed help. 

‘I need something,’ He tells her as he slides into a chair on the opposite side of her own in the library. 

Lily glares. ‘And why should I -?’

‘It’s for Remus,’ Sirius interrupts because they were…close all things considered. They had a lot in common with their books and fondness of both Muggle literature and music (something Sirius had also started to appreciate. Just last month Remus had introduced him to a thing called “Rock” and oh, but it was glorious -). They also occasionally studied together. James was very jealous.

They’d probably get on better if Remus wasn’t a "Marauder" (a name given to them by one particular ghost). Though he could be just as devious. It was just to his own skill that he could fool everyone so well.

‘Remus?’ Lily asks hesitantly, some of the tension easing out of her shoulders.

Sirius nods. ‘I need a book.’

‘A present?’ Lily infers with the knowledge that Remus’ birthday isn’t far off but Sirius shakes his head.

‘I need a book for Animagi.’

Lily’s glare is back and it's just as angry as before. ‘Don’t lie to me, Black. This isn’t for -’

Sirius huffs a pained, exaggerated sigh. ‘Think about how Remus is always sick every time the moon is full. Think about that and then come back to me.’

Lily’s smart. One of the smartest in their year. It doesn’t take a few days before there's a book sitting innocently on Sirius’ bedsheets and he reckons two of those are spent finding it. 

* * *

 

He squirrels James and Peter away while Remus was being busy pretending to be a Prefect. (Because once a prankster, always a prankster no matter what any pin said.) He showed them the book and explained for Peter how this was important, how this could change things. It didn’t take much more than that for the boys to be on board.

The first step: Occlumency.

The problem with that came after a month and they were starting to make headway. James and Peter were okay, ‘sides for some increase in memories long thought lost but for Sirius it was torture.

It was remembering; reliving his mother as she Cursed him. As his father touched him -

No! _NO!_ **NO!**

Sirius broke away from his bed, jerking up so hard that he tumbled off his mattress. In his rush of movement, pulled his neck and didn’t care. Sirius barely noticed as he breathed like he had run a Muggle marathon. He was sweaty with terror bearing down on him and his limbs trembling like he had been hit with an Unforgivable. He looked around the darkness of his dorm, the shapes that once gave him comfort in their familiarity now left him jumping at every shadow.

He crawled to James’ bed without thought, without a moment of consideration to his pride. Sirius pulled back his friend’s bed curtain but couldn't quite make it into the bed for all he struggled; could barely move as he fought to breathe. Any second now his mother’s wand would be in his face; his father’s hand would be on his back, between his -

‘Sirius?’ 

The voice was groggy but James was propped up, half turned towards Sirius and rubbing his eyes clear. ‘James,’ Sirius' voice strangles the name and suddenly James is moving, eyes wide and worried but his hands are gentle even as they strain themselves to lift Sirius’ dead weight into bed.

James somehow manages it after the fourth try where Sirius was starting to think that he would be left for his parents to hurt him in the dark, a sob working its way through his panic when his friend hefts him onto his warm mattress, quickly shutting the bed curtains behind them and patting around for his wand to perform a quick Silencing Spell. 

Sirius can feel James fumbling as he collapses against him; knows it’s safe in these arms to relax and find solace in as they clutch at him just a bit too tight. James makes shushing noises and saying words he can’t quite hear.

The next morning, Sirius wakes up where he went to sleep with James looking at him like he’s afraid Sirius will disappear. The dorm is quiet; empty. It's obviously late in the day and Sirius doesn’t care, halfway between deep embarrassment and brazen carelessness.

‘You don’t have to do this,’ James says finally and Sirius has never taken such comfort in morning breath before. ‘I can try hard enough for the both of us.’

‘Yeah.’ Sirius responds, closing his eyes as his forehead presses against James’ chest. He can barely free the button sticking into his forehead. ‘Yeah, I do.’

* * *

Step two: mediation.

For obvious reasons, this is hard. Black’s don’t have very good mental capacities as Sirius is well aware, but he sits and tries and tries. “Fake it until you make it” is the expression he had heard Lily utter once.

Yeah, that.

Little by little, it starts to help.

* * *

Steps four to ten don’t bear thinking about (neither do those blasted leafs) and the first shift even less so. In fact, the only instance Sirius likes to remember of one of their first transformations is when James got stuck with antlers for three hours, and ended up hiding in an abandoned classroom they had been using for practice while the rest of them went back to class without him.

'Look at those prongs!’ Sirius jokingly marvelled through pain as his bones still ached and his muscles were still protesting from his own shifts into doghood. But the pain was something he was used to and this at least was for something good.

James had glared though his mouth jerked, not at all as mad as he was trying to portray. ‘D-do not make me stab you with these things, Paws.’

‘That's an awful nickname.’ Sirius had laughed a brief bark.

‘I’ll work on it.’

* * *

It's a full moon and they meet Remus at the Shrieking Shack. They had followed him and only let him know they were there when they had gotten well out of sight from Hogwarts. Predictably Remus doesn’t react well. So close to his time of the month, he’s all but violent.

‘What were you _thinking_?!’ Remus yells at them, voice hoarse. He’s not a shouter, not at all and Sirius almost flinches back on instinct but trust keeps him steady and in place. ‘If this is a joke then it's not bloody funny! Go back - go back before you get us all killed!’

There's desperation and hurt, fuelled with something else that Sirius can’t name as Remus’ eyes get steadily more ember. His change was near but they can’t let him go into it with such negative thoughts. They might have explained this to him first but they didn’t want him to try and talk them out of this.

‘You know, Messrs Padfoot, I think Moony here is under a misunderstanding.’ James nudges him, his tone is calm and his eyes are direct. 

‘I think you’re right, Messrs Prongs,’ Sirius agrees easily even as Remus, hunched over but watching them with a confoundedness that any other day would be funny frowns at them. ‘Messrs Wormtail, don’t you think it prudent that we…say, let the animals out of the bag?’

Peter nods, his smile growing even if he’s a bit pale. ‘Too right.’

They take a breath together and shift.

Remus’ expression is a picture. 

* * *

It could have been the fresh wounds that were going to scar and bruises that ached. It could have been the fallout with Sirius’ brother and the new mark he carried on his arm but Sirius had very little patience. James noticed early, since first spotting him in their compartment. James just tended to know things and Sirius’ mood was one of them.

The thing about James though, was he never demands an explanation. Never forces Sirius to talk. He simply sat down next to Sirius, took one hard look at his slumped form and the way he was clutching at his arm and gently started to try and pry it from Sirius’ other hand which was clutched around his elbow. 

Sirius grits his teeth and doesn’t say a word as they rearranged themselves until he was all but on Jame’s lap and James was trying to uncurl his fingers on his injured arm. Sirius hisses but refuses to make a sound even when his friend glances up at him with hot anger and deep sadness when James gets Sirius out of his robes and then his shirt. It is a long, drawn out process and Remus and Peter should have found them by now -

‘Sorry, Padfoot,’ James says as he jostles Sirius by accident as the train suddenly pulls to a start. 

Sirius shakes his head but looks away as his skin is finally revealed and concentrates at all the noise of the train; its wheels, its shrill whistle. The other students who are still trying to find somewhere to sit -

_‘Sirius,’_ James breathes.

And this - _this_ is the worst part of having someone who cares.

* * *

His injuries this time took months to heal as it was more than what James and Remus between them could fix. (James’ speciality was transfiguration and Remus was near good at anything but healing was not something that came easily to him, probably due to his lycanthropy but they learnt for him. Both had researched until even a few teachers had questioned if either had any interest in being a Healer.)

Sirius was still short-tempered and irritable. He answered most questions from teachers with monosyllables, was vicious in Quidditch to the point where there was talk of him being pulled from the team and his pranks bordered on cruel.

During this time he was helping to make the map. It was honestly for security as they were all getting just a bit paranoid as the war got to the point where it could truly be called a war without people frowning at " _exaggerations_ "; no need to fear monger after all. (Whatever that was meant to mean, people were dying.) It also had the added benefits of being great for pranks though Sirius was in little mood for jokes. 

He was sore and he knew without a doubt that if he returned to his parents next holiday like they had demanded with his stance on this Dark-Light conflict, he might not get back to Hogwarts’ next term. That, and his brother - Regulus -

Sirius behaved terribly. People were whispering. People were noticing. James had taken to following him, just a foot or two behind ( _‘to keep you from doing something you’d regret,’_ Had been said which nearly resulted in an argument. They _never_ argued.)

And then - then he notices Snape poking around the Shrieking Shake. Asking questions. Snape knew. Snape was trying to hurt Remus. Snape never fucking _stopped_ , did he? Sirius was going to _make_ him stop -

He confronts Snape; tells him to turn up at a meeting place.

(And there, at that one moment is one of his biggest regrets.)

(Not that Sirius was trying to kill Snape. The fact that, that bastard survives was another. No, it was that Remus had been used as the tool. That he had hurt Remus in Snape’s place.)

* * *

Remus was too forgiving but even then he couldn’t look at Sirius and Sirius feeling raw and pulled apart, couldn’t blame him . James pulled him aside. ‘You can’t go back again.’

‘What?’ Sirius says. He hadn’t felt calmer or more miserable in months and he wasn’t keeping up well; with all that he had missed in his moment of Black madness.

‘To your - parents. You can’t go back,’ James asserts with eyes like Sirius has never seen before. ‘We’re…Sirius. I think I’m gonna lose you if you do. I think you’ll lose yourself.’ 

Sirius' heart freezes in his chest and his mind goes back to the Hat and Ollivander and suddenly the weight of the wand in his pocket is a burden he doesn’t think he can bear. It is, still, as it always will be, a wand that no Black could hold, could use or _would_. It would not allow Dark magic, would not allow what was starting to perish in himself. 

(And Sirius had noticed the sudden resistance his wand was giving him. He had just thought - well, he hadn’t. And then, Sirius knew he was falling.) Sirius swallows and nods. The day his wand rejects him is the day that Sirius loses everything he has come to love; is the day that he loses everyone who matters. It's the day he becomes his parents and all he despises.

James squeezes his shoulder like he doesn’t want to let go and his eyes behind his glasses are tight. 

* * *

Sirius runs. Sirius runs from his house, his parents and all their evils. He knew that if he didn’t he would become something he wouldn’t recognise. Getting blasted off of that wall…it feels like an accomplishment.

Sirius makes it the Potter’s manor via the Knight Bus and has to walk through the miles of grounds and struggle with the wards until he reaches the front stairs. The Potter’s must have sensed him long before because they're standing there (James and his parents) in their night clothes, waiting until he crosses the boundary. James doesn’t even hold back for Sirius to make it the last step before he’s tackling Sirius into a hug, the worry evident but also the relief.

‘You’re staying, Padfoot,’ James states. ‘Even if you're not house broken.’

Sirius huffs a laugh and looks at the kind face of Charlus Potter and then the compassionate one of Dorea Potter nee Black. Her eyes speak a thousand stories, emphatic like their silently saying: “ _I know. I’ve been where you’ve stood.”_ And When James introduces him, the way she bows - like is traditional - before pulling him to a brief hug - which is anything but - says it all.

* * *

Sirius is given his own room. It's painted a peachy sort of red that's warm and comfortable. The bed’s grand but has a certain softness to it and there are a desk and a window, an en-suite and a walk in wardrobe. They could have made him sleep outside and Sirius would still have felt like part of the family. They’ve all but adopted him and he comes to understand, from them, what family and love are meant to mean.

Dorea though she looks every inch as unforgiving as the proudest of Black’s has gentled with age, maybe even marriage - and had come to see him a few nights after his first. The talk was enlightening and her parting words were splashed with humour. ‘Truly, the Potter’s can brighten just about anything,’ Dorea tells him in a hushed whisper like she was betraying a whisper. ‘It’s the eyes. They can see potential. My old fool knew right away that he wanted me, even when I was so sure of my own path. I’m glad my son inherited his eyes from his father. It's arguably his best trait.’

Sirius nods though he feels undeserving. He’ll never be able to give back half of what James has given him. Dorea pauses before a sharp smirk is curving her face into something that Sirius would recognise more on James. She sighs, as if pained. ‘The hair, though,’ she complains, ‘the _hair_.’

And Sirius laughs.

* * *

It is in the heat of the war and Sirius chosen his side, well and truly. He’s just come back from this detention that had seen Dorea send a Howler (so very different from the special kind of treatment his own mother gave him) and no one would look at him.

Sirius knows something’s wrong. The Common Room quietened down from whatever noise there had been and everyone’s eyes were averted. He thinks about how many points he lost yesterday but quickly shakes that away. 

He ponders it. His only conclusions leads to something unfortunate and he’s about to ask when Frank steps forward, Alice Elwyn at his side. Frank is a sort-of friend. A nice bloke whose a joint Chaser with James so they saw quite a lot of each other with him and Alice as Beater’s. They talked some but never spent that much time together out of meals and practice. (Frank was closer to James but that was fair. The Longbottom and Potter families had been allied through the generations.)

What Sirius notices, however, is Frank’s grim face and Alice’s glassy eyes. ‘Sirius…’ Frank begins helplessly as he glances to Alice.

‘T-the paper.’ Alice stutters, ‘it was… The Potter’s -’

Sirius' stomach leaves him and he knows before they finish.

Frank closes his eyes. ‘They were killed yesterday, fighting. They saved a - a lot of people but… They got separated from their group,’ He says. There was a rush of buzzing and voice slowly got smaller and smaller. ‘They’ve - they’ve been killed. I’m - I know you were close to the Potter’s. I’m - I’m very sorry.’ 

They’ve been killed.

Sirius thinks about Dorea’s few and genuine smiles; the one soul he found that understood his struggles; the one guiding light he had had. They’ve been killed. Sirius thinks about Charlus and the man’s laugh - how he was always so quick to laugh - his warm voice and his cheery grins. Sirius thinks about the two that had taken him in without question and had treated Sirius like he belonged there; with no reluctance but with warmth and affection. 

Sirius thinks about the couple who had loved him enough to be displeased with him but care despite it and never be disappointed or ashamed -

Sirius wasn’t even aware that his knees hit the Common Room floor seconds later.

* * *

There were points in time where Sirius had thought very exasperatedly negative thoughts about Lily Evans, however much he liked her, but anything bad that had ever crossed his mind he wiped away as she went on to spend all her free time not only picking James up but Sirius too.

And really, James seemed to be in a state of numb shock. He was dealing, kept hold of Lily like they had a Permanent Sticking Charm on each other, couldn’t leave a room without Sirius and was keeping an eye on any other friend with an obsession that was unhealthy. Sirius himself wasn’t well and didn’t realise how bad they were until years later.

Meantime, he found himself crawling into James’ bed to a point where it was now a common occasion. No one commented on it, nor did anyone mention Lily’s presence in the boy’s dorm either. She was in the middle of the bed with an arm around James’ shoulders and hearing Sirius’ entrance she opened the other for him so he could shuffle into her embrace. James’ only acknowledgement that Sirius was there was the sudden tight arm around his waist.

It must have been uncomfortable for Lily having nearly two fully grown teenagers on top of her as she held them both, but she did like it was her duty to carry them. Like by simply holding them it was enough to protect them. It wasn’t, but it helped and Sirius promised himself in his few hours of awareness to pay it forward.

* * *

‘What do you think?’ James asks with a smile that spanned from one ear to his other, so wide Sirius was half curious how his face wasn't broken but he obligingly took the black box from his friend and carefully flicked it open. Inside, between a slit of a velvet cushion sat a ring, proud and bold just like James but with enough beauty to it that it matched a creature such as Lily.

The band was gold with a woven platinum strand, in its centre was a diamond that was as large as a person’s nail and which had been carved into a flower. Sirius smiled. ‘It’s perfect.’

Honestly, the Wizarding World didn’t really do rings and he was sure that James wouldn’t have insisted upon one instead of the courting torque and then bonding cuffs, if not for who was getting asked. James didn’t want to scare her off though Sirius knew he had, had a torque custom made for Lily, something which still sat in a box in a drawer somewhere. (Potter bonding cuffs would also be in his vaults.)

And, honestly, Lily was in this for keeps. She wasn’t a fickle person though she was more than capable of saying goodbye to people, it wouldn’t be because of a difference in cultural traditions. She would be flattered if it was explained to her but it wasn’t for Sirius to say so he left it alone.

Nervously, James nodded as Sirius handed the ring back. He hadn’t seen James like this since Lily had accepted his offer to a date after years of asking. James straightened his clothes again. ‘Do I look okay?’

Sirius could joke but in this one thing, he never would. ‘You’ll make her knees go weak. Now get outta here before you’re late. Show her a good time. We both know she’s not going to say anything but yes.’

James swallowed as he was pocketing the box. He nodded like his head was too heavy for him but he stood from his chair and started to leave. ‘Just remember you’ll be my best man, Padfoot,’ he informs Sirius just as he opens the door.

It closes to Sirius’ gaping mouth which only works in his favour because soon as the shock fades there are tears stinging.

'That wasn't a question, _jerk_ ,’ Sirius manages to choke, grinning so hard that it hurts. James is still close enough to hear and laughs his way out of the front door.

* * *

Lily and James’ wedding is but a flutter in the distance, they’ve got jobs (aurors. _Fun_. Note the sarcasm? Yeah, it's _not_ what it’s made out to be in the paper. The Ministry is bloody _useless_ ), responsibilities and they’ve even joined the Order. Sirius fights the Death Eaters, has killed a fair number and every time he strikes one down his mind always thinks _“could that be Regulus? Please don’t be Regulus.”_

It's hard and trying and he’s added to his number of scars but his friendships are still strong. Sirius goes to the Godric's Hollow, stops himself from growling at the cat at the doorway and announces his presence instead by shouting his welcome. Worryingly it takes several seconds before there’s an answer.

‘Upstairs, Sirius,’ Lily calls tiredly.

Sirius glanced around, feels on edge but there are no disturbances around the house and a Revealing Spell proves only two humans are here. His magic recognises them, even that far away so Sirius steps out of his shoes and walks up the stairs and allows himself entrance to the happy couple’s bedroom.

It takes his eyes a moment to adjust to the dark. When they do, Sirius sees Lilly and James curled up in bed and it looks anything but happy. They are clinging to each other, desperate and needy. Sirius stares for a moment but continues forward after taking his jacket and belt off when James reaches out for him with a look that says he’s just woken up and isn’t all there yet.

Sirius’ kneels on the mattress, feels it dip under him and clasps hold of James hand over Lily’s form. He waits for a moment - because they’re older now and these two are married and he doesn’t want to overstep - but Lily simply shifts closer to James, offering Sirius more room and he takes it. Curls up against her as James pulls them all together with the grip he has on Sirius’ hand. 

Sirius tries to get comfortable but there's a pit in him that should be his stomach so he has to ask. ‘What’s wrong?’

It takes a moment for them to answer him but when they do, Sirius understands.

‘We’re having a baby.’ 

* * *

 

There's a baby in Sirius’ arms. A _baby_. Newly born and so, so special. He’s not even spoken his first words yet or walked his first steps and there's already so much riding on this one tiny life. Sirius hates prophecies and won’t let something as flimsy as an un-adventured path dedicate his future.

“Harry” was Lily’s pick and Sirius can’t bring himself to put the baby down though his arms are aching. There's a stinging to his eyes and his throat feels strangely tight but - but he doesn’t even _like_ babies! They're small and breakable, pink and wrinkly. They don’t _do anything._

And yet, Sirius found himself loving Harry.

‘Sirius,’ Lily murmured with exhaustion that was easy to see with her hair plastered to her forehead and neck. Her eyes were barely visible as she struggles to keep them open even as she observes him. James’ holding her up like his greatest fear at this moment, was for her to vanish like some kind of dream but his smiles big even if its crushed with stress and fear.

‘Yeah?’ Sirius replies but can’t quite look away.

‘We think you should be godfather.’ 

Sirius’ head snaps up so fast he thinks he loses it.

* * *

He’s talking to Frank until he’s not. His Wellness Alarm is triggered - set off and suddenly he’s dropping his drink, his everything. Doesn’t hear Frank as he sprints away because he’s got to _go_. There’s only one way to exit the Ministry and that way is not quick but he needs to leave - needs to have been gone five minutes ago.

Sirius can’t remember his journey, he barely remembers entering Godric’s Hollow. All he sees is the dead cat and knows. The door is ajar, his useless key burns his hands and when he pushes the barrier away Sirius can’t even get a foot inside before his heart breaks.

_James_.

His friend is twenty-one. He is a father of a gorgeous baby boy and the husband to the best woman around. They are the most _wonderful_ people anyone could imagine. They’ve put themselves in harm's way for no other reason than they think it's what's right. They saved Sirius from his parents, from himself. 

And all that stops and ends with James lying still on the stairs.

He’s lying on the stairs. Not moving. Not -

_breathing_.

James’ eyes are closed. His glasses are sat crooked on his nose, like he woke up in a rush. His hair was almost as dark as Sirius’ own and is so impossibly untidy it speaks of an even bigger hurry. He was wearing an oversized jumper and faded jeans and he was missing a sock.It was almost like nothing had changed. Sirius chokes, doesn’t think, doesn’t check the area like he's been taught. Like an _auror_ should. He stumbles forward, hands reach out; all Sirius ever had to do - all either one of them had to do - was reach out and -

James is still warm. Still warm but _empty_ of life.

James is twenty-one. A father and a husband. Sirius' best friend; his _brother_ in all but blood. 

James is a father and a husband - a father and a - -

‘ _LILY_!’ Sirius bellows as he finds his feet. Can’t feel his legs. Has to stand over - to - to get to the stairs. He trips, once, twice. Falls and nearly breaks his face on the landing. ‘LILY! _HARRY_!’ 

Sirius thinks of green eyes. Panics, can’t remember which one’s which as he scrambles for the nursery - he had helped paint it. They had all helped paint it. He had gotten them all plastered and they had laughed -

That door is smiling wide now. Broken. Sirius’ eyes drop down to red. Always red; Lily’s hair, more auburn like a rose faded in the sunlight. James loves her hair, would take any excuse to wrap his fingers around it - and she’s been left in a heap. A wonderful woman. A beautiful woman who had put up with everything life threw at her - who was a fighter and who stood up for her beliefs and forced herself to be strong -

She was laying in a heap. 

“You cannot die with dignity. You can only live with it,” Sirius remembers the quote but can't recall if it’s Muggle or not, because somewhere along the way that had all blurred together and he remembers and _remembers and remembers and remembers -_

There's a cry. 

Sirius jerks and - Harry. 

Harry.

Precious little Harry with his big green eyes and impossible hair. Baby Harry with a future too big, too asking. Harry who was smothered in love to make up for the world who would rather just _smother_ him.

Sirius runs to him, throwing himself to his knees in front of his godson. The baby he had spoiled but never enough - _never_ enough because there was never time or it simply wasn’t the _right_ time in a world so broken, so awful that they were fighting for it so much they couldn’t live within it. Harry’s bleeding with a wound that wasn't there before - and oh, but if Sirius could just wipe that off of Harry's beautiful face - but he's alive and reaching back for Sirius.

Sirius picks him up, holds him close and thinks he cries.

Then Hagrid comes. 

* * *

Sirius knew now what he didn’t back when he was eleven-years-old and struggling with where he thought Peter should be placed. He hadn’t guessed Gryffindor; hadn't been sure. Peter had taken a long time under the Hat and was considered one of the few hatstalls in Hogwart's history.

But Sirius knows now. 

Peter was a Slytherin. 

And isn’t that funny? Sirius thinks as he’s left to laugh, _utterly_ defeated and on his knees in a destroyed Muggle street. Isn’t that funny? He thinks he’s laughing. He isn’t sure. It's funny because there's something to say about nature or some such shit like that. 

Sirius had been running all his life from what he was and thought he could be better with what his wand said about him, with James and his friends and through the choices he made. 

Why was that _different_ for Peter?

Why couldn't Peter choose to be _better_?

And Sirius hadn't known - would never have guessed - had _suggested_ they switch the Secret Keeper to Peter. Remus would have been better obviously but there were doubts. Of course, there were. Remus was a _dark creature_ and - on looking back, who had first brought up those concerns? _Peter_. Funny, that.

Sweet, little Peter. Nervous Peter. Backstabbing, _friend-murdering,_ **kin-slaying** _scum_ Peter. _Wormtail_. His form had never suited him more. Maybe that was another warning? How ironic. How _funny_.

Sirius thinks about Wormtail’s face before he had transformed, thinks it reminds him of Snape. He feels sick but the laughter buries it. Because it's all so _funny_. 

Peter knew everything about him. Knew his struggle with the Dark, with his own mind and had concocted this and it was _perfect_. Wormtail was a Death Eater and had set Sirius up for the perfect fall. It was idiot prove and just look at the results. 

A hand slaps itself down on his trembling shoulder but he’s still laughing. It's an auror with another four behind. ‘Black? What happened -?’

‘My fault’ he laughs for not seeing. ‘My fault’ he laughs _for thinking switching the Secret Keeper was a good idea._ ‘My fault. My fault. My fault. My fault.’ 

And then there's someone trying to shake but they don’t understand. A wand is pointed in his face. _This_ \- this is -

Blackness. 

Sirius will wake up thirteen years later.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So. Sirius’ Wand. I tried wiki-ing it and it's not there. I had to come up with it and James’ core for that matter. I choose Aspen and unicorn hair in the end after a lot of researching. Why? I loved the irony. Aspen was ivory. Just. Sorry. I can’t babble about that. I chose Dragon heartstring for James because people would expect it to be the other way round with Dragon heartstring more lent towards the Dark.
> 
> This whole chapter really was a battle with oneself. I wanted that to be really obvious. Sirius in my head is a really complicated character because his life ruined him. His wand spoke of his potential while that was destroyed no matter the decisions he made. 
> 
> And while he was trying to make all the right choices, someone else wasn’t. My mum is always telling me to “be careful who you involve in your life. It only takes one”. Everyone knew what was going to happen with Peter but - I’m actually a little pleased with this. 
> 
> I also managed to get that fail break down in there of “Black madness” which contributed with Sirius being seen as a maniac so the arrest could happen. Something Peter countered on. Oh! And that thing about Peter nearly being chosen for Slytherin? I didn’t make that up. (Nor am I implying that I think all Slytherin’s are evil.)


	3. Freak Dreams...

Boy dreams in colour. 

He dreams of red - red like her hair; like roses. Red like the beads of blood that would well on his knee after his balance upends him. Red like the walls used to be, glowing with weird symbols. Red like the eyes of a monster, eyes that glared down at him long after she fell.

He dreams of yellow - yellow for tired hair and matching eyes. Yellow for his plastic knife and fork long gone. Yellow for the flowers in the kitchen window, wilting but surviving in the darker months. Yellow like the tie the rat wore the last he visited on two legs. 

He dreams of blue - blue for the sky. Blue like the rug with moving animals that he used to play on, that he was learning to walk on. Blue like the bruises he sees hidden under collared shirts and blouses. Blue for plasters with rabbits on them. Blue for his first and last birthday cake. Blue for the tears that were coloured in the gaze of his nightlight, trailing down her cheeks as she furiously whispered words he can’t always hear.

He dreams of black - black for kind, laughing eyes. Black for coarse, thick fur of the dog that liked to curl around him. Black for the marks under their eyes that they smiled through. Black for the cloak of shadows that forced its way through warmth and security. Black for the _searing_ pain that encompassed him; worse than anything his relatives had tried to do to him since.

And then he dreams of green - green for her eyes that always shined down to him. Green for the garden that was trying to grow. Green for the plants that were always in and out of the hallways; green for love and living. Green like -

Green like the light that stops her, which leaves her still.

Green like the light that cuts into him, that abandons him into a waking nightmare.

Freak dreams in colour and sometimes that _hurts_ but…it’s still better than whatever happens in the monochrome world outside the cupboard. In the dark, is where the colours are.

* * *

Boy couldn’t say when he learnt that he wasn’t wanted in this new, cold house. It was just something he was always aware of from every hug the potato got, that he wasn’t allowed. From every chore he did, that the potato didn’t have to do. From every soft word sent the potato’s way that turn biting and harsh when directed Boy’s way.

He knew the difference, he grew to understand it. He wasn’t the potato and the walrus and the horse didn’t want him here. 

That was okay, Boy remembered enough of his old home; of faded people still in his mind to know that things weren’t always like this - to realise that this wasn’t right. 

In retaliation, he gives them “cheek”. He talks back, he’s sassy and dances all over the sensitive spots he finds. The walrus and horse have plenty and _anything_ will set the potato off into frustrated tears.

(Boy thinks he remembers two men who laughed with their souls even if their eyes were sad, and thinks distantly that they would appreciate his way of dealing with it.)

* * *

The horse shrieks when she’s angry at Boy, like her voice is trying to escape her throat or her soul has a puncture and she’s releasing all the air out when she opens her mouth; like that time walrus' car got a flat tire. Either way, it is unpleasant and the quickest way for Boy to know when he needs to duck.

Learning how to use the stove; to cook breakfast is harder than picking up after the potato or unpacking the groceries. There’s spitting oil and boiling water that splatter onto his hands and arms, sometimes his face when he’s straining up over the flame to see if something is “done”.

Baking hurts less but that’s not easy to do either. He just wants to sit down, to listen to the complaining aches that whisper from a hard cot and gardening work. The potato doesn’t have to do anything, he gets to play and relax and  Boy thinks he’s okay with that. 

(Salt instead of sugar or fat instead of butter is the closet he can get to sabotage.)

* * *

Red hair and warm hugs, hazel eyes and laughter; those are the clearest impressions of from before. They also aren’t the types of things that the horse mentions when she rants about how Boy ended up on their respectable doorstep.

She says his father was a good for nothing drunkard that was on the road while intoxicated and killed himself, and the horse's useless sister when they ran a red light with Boy in the backseat. The walrus said his mother was a whore, insisted that she used to give him the “eyes” when she was alive and that he deserved what he got; that he was better off without them. 

The horse always goes onto say how his father and mother caused his scar and to never forget.

He doesn’t.

* * *

Boy sleeps with spiders. One in particular visits him in the dark, every night which is someone Boy can talk with, someone who pays attention. It’s worth the hours of sleep it costs him, quietly murmuring words he's on the cusp of forgetting.

Boy always waits for his spider, until the horse cleans his room out with his two waste buckets after he had gotten ill. He had been waiting in the hallway when she suddenly screamed on seeing Boy’s large, furry friend. 

His stomach is still turning, he is hazy with fever and unable to stand but Boy still tries to save spider.

…he doesn’t.

Boy is forced back into the cupboard after spider is smeared along on the wooden rafters, to suffer an empty stomach alone. 

* * *

The whale visits. She’s the walrus’ sister and might just hate Boy the most out of all three of them. The whale stays in the guest bedroom with her three bulldogs and the dogs are just as rough with him as the whale is.

Maybe it was the sunburn, maybe his patience was just wearing thin but he gets a bit nippy. Words that should have stayed in his head had just…slipped out. He was used to the horse’s frying pan and a few kicks or punches from the walrus, even the potato would throw things at him now, but… none of it prepared him for when the whale set her dogs on him.

They were all claws and teeth and muscle. They _rip_ _into him._ The sharp, burning pain forces him into darkness and it is still there when he wakes up from muted colours and a woman’s scream, locked inside the cupboard.

Boy is sore, he _hurts_ but it is an echo of what it was and when he rolls up the torn and dirtied track suit. He only sees pink, healing skin, his hands, calloused and rough push again his calfs but feels no indentations, no grazes.

It’s tender though, and the sensations shoot up his legs to a degree that Boy has to stop. His mind is hazed but he still thinks it’s odd that the holes and cuts aren’t still there.

Boy gets a few days to contemplate this before the horse is throwing the cupboard door open after undoing the locks. The…sneer on her face doesn’t seem right, it’s sharper, fiercer and when she address him…

“Freak” is what she calls him. 

* * *

The walrus drinks more and the horse has started to eat less and the potato pushes Boy around a lot. Things are tenser, like the animosity has entered the air and now Freak has to breathe it too.

Freak doesn’t remember what happened with the whale, not properly, but he knows it is why everything is so much harsher; why the horse does more than source pans, why the walrus has started…punishments to “beat it out of him”. 

Freak doesn’t know what “it” is but it has him more reluctant to deal with them with words. 

* * *

There are no colours now, not in general, not really. The colours were him, painted on his skin from hits and kicks and getting pushed over, from getting thrown into things and down things and through things.

The horse forces layers of long clothing on top to cover all the colour. The uniform for school she buys him is from a charity shop and is tough and stiff from having to dyed it to match the potato’s, which is new and soft to the touch. 

Freak doesn’t mind that much, the furtherest they’ve ever taken him is down the street to the cat lady. With school, they have to let him go. He had heard the arguments about it from in the cupboard. 

Freak was…almost excited for it. 

* * *

Boy is sat to a table, a girl with dark hair and eyes is next to him and he’s never seen someone thats looked like her before. It is…interesting. He tries not to stare, it was the quickest way other than speaking to get a hit to the back of the head.

Freak refocuses on the teacher who has started “registration” but with every name, Freak feels more and more uncomfortable. _Meg, Thomas, Jane, Mark, Britney, Catherine, Hubert, Theo, Amelia…_

Every name is so - _wonderful._

Then there’s “Freak”.

Freak is awful. Freak is cooking and cooking and not eating. Freak is the walrus drinking too much and dragging Freak away for punishment. Freak is the horse’s nails digging into his skin. Freak is the potato pushing him around. 

Freak’s…

Then the teacher calls for “Harry” and - 

Freak’s ears ring and faintly he thinks he hears another woman’s voice calling him. 

When he gets home the walrus is purpling after he'd been on the phone with the school, who had some choice questions about why Freak - why _Harry_ wouldn’t recognise his name. Harry is smacked across the face before the front door can even fully close when he returned.

* * *

Harry finds out that the girl is Chinese and her name back there was Lanfen but she was Freddy here. She liked fighting cartoons, had stationary with cutely drawn animals on them and had parents who were doctors back home. She lived with a “host family” with a boy in class, Austin and ate weird foods.

He liked asking her questions, she was - nice. She was sometimes hard to understand so a lot of the class didn’t like to talk to her but Harry did. It was easy to hear what she was saying if you listened and she seemed happy that Harry tried, even if he occasional got confused. 

The differences between them were wide but she always let him sit next to her and she never raised her voice, she never hit him. One day she went home annoyed with Harry, stomping towards Austin and her host mum. Harry had thought that that was it but the next day she had sort of squinted at him, before sighing and asking him if he had heard of _manhua._

* * *

It reaches July and the teacher mentions his birthday. Harry hadn’t known he had one, though he cooked birthday cakes for the Potato, saw the presents and the cards but he hadn’t thought much of it. Harry had just nodded at the teacher, made sure to remember the date even if it wasn’t important now and carried on with his day.

 _31st of July,_ he thinks and then moves on.

Next week, it’s Monday, his birthday. Harry had stayed up late to see himself a year older, understanding that that would be it for him. He wasn’t the potato, the horse wouldn’t make a fuss, wouldn’t squeeze his cheeks and tell him how big he had grown. The walrus wouldn’t clap him on the back, wouldn’t look at him proudly.

Freddy has other ideas. 

At morning break, she takes him behind the bins and pulls out a small, wrapped package with an envelope sellotaped to the front with his name written in pen. 

Harry stares, unsure of what to do until she gets annoyed and shoves it in his hands. He finds himself delicately folding back the paper to reveal a hand drawn card and a gift.

It is a multicoloured bracelet, a token of “friendship” she says. She has a similar one around her wrist and he promises to wear it. Freddy thinks he’s weird when he ties it to his ankle but Harry knows that the horse would cut it off and throw it away if she saw it. 

* * *

His teacher’s hair is blue.

His teacher’s hair is blue and somehow it is Harry’s fault. The whole class is laughing but the potato is staring at Harry with beady little blue eyes. They are still narrowed when he tells the walrus and the horse at dinnertime, only after Harry has cooked. 

Because the potato was smart enough to understand that as soon as he had ratted Harry out, that Harry would be taken away and wouldn't be able to make dinner. He misses a week of school for a “cold”.

* * *

Harry was only in the room because he was making the popcorn but he glances up to see a Chinese person on the telly with a dark man. Harry briefly catches the title when the channel is switched, that it was a movie called _Rush Hour._

The walrus complains about _what the world was coming to_ when people like _them_ were allowed onto television.

Harry doesn’t really get it, wonders what the walrus means even when Harry finds himself clenching his jaw. He drops the bowl of popcorn on the walrus’ head and growls back when the walrus’ fist finds its way to Harry’s stomach.

* * *

Harry does well at school until he’s not. Every good grade that is mirrored in the reverse for the potato who didn’t seem to have two brain cells to rub together. Not that the potato _cared,_ he would much rather spend his time taking their classmates' lunches or pushing people around at break.

Harry comes back to the house on a Friday with three tests that have full marks, compared with the potato who completely failed every one. It didn’t take much more than that for the horse to lash out with nothing but her hands.

* * *

“Harry Hunting” has turned out to be a bit of a one-sided sport for the potato and his similarly challenged friends. They all know each other from the neighbourhood and sharing the same school seems to have only made them _worse._

Harry is fast though and Harry has learnt how to run. It feels - wrong, unnatural when every instinct in his body is telling him to turn back, stand strong. Is telling him to _fight._ His gut burns and sometimes it hurts to breathe but he runs. 

It is hard for Harry to explain why. 

* * *

Attention comes and nearly all of it’s bad. Harry can't seem to do anything right and half thinks he’d prefer to be invisible because at least then he’d get some peace. Even his hair is wrong. _It’s too dark,_ the horse with her light mane of perfectly done hair would sneer. _It’s too long as well, you look like a ruffian._

That’s when the clippers come out. She scalps him, nicking him a few times as she does so. She keeps the fringe long to hide his “hideous” scar and Harry only has the chance to stare at his reflection for a second, before the horse is manhandling him off of his seat and forcing him back into his cupboard.

That night he had curled up in his cot and thinks about all the trouble this will cause him; every nasty word, every point and jeer, he’ll have to endure at school tomorrow as he bleeds lightly into his pillow. He thinks about it - thinks until he has fallen into a restless sleep, dreaming about black flying motorbikes and men that can change into animals.

When he wakes up to the horse banging on the cupboard door like the world’s most violent alarm clock, he shifts to get up and instantly feels the weight of his hair, feels the long strands curl faithful around his neck. Harry runs his hands over his head and his heart stalls when he feels wild tresses softening against his skull. It’s silky and messy and _there_ and Harry’ll take any punishment for it.

When the horse opens the door to let him out to make breakfast it takes a second on seeing him for her to notice, and when she does her face twists itself into something else. Eyes dimming with disgust, she grabs him by his regrown hair and forces him into the kitchen.

(Every day after school the horse will try to cut his hair again and every attempt is twice as harsh as the day before. The horse will only stop a week and a half later.)

* * *

Harry’s never really fought back before, sure he’s sort of a scrappy thing and his cheek is apparently an issue but he hasn’t ever properly hit back. Maybe it was because, secretly, he’s always wanted what the potato had and he knew that by hurting them in return he’d destroy his only chance.

This changes. Freddy had been with him out on the playground, she had been trying to explain with words she didn’t really have yet what her home was like back in China,  when the potato saw them sitting on the curb and came plodding over. 

Harry didn’t get much of a chance to even explain who the potato was to her before he was pulled up by the hair with grabby, fat fingers. He faintly hears Freddy’s exclamation but otherwise tries to stay clam.

There is a fire in his belly, it had been growing for years but he can’t - doesn’t let it go until the potato turns on Freddy. He had already taken a few blows to the torso and had thought, laying on the ground wheezing that that would be it. 

He’s wrong.

Freddy’s arm is wrenched away from her body and Harry didn’t need to hear the horrible crack to understand how hurt she was. Nor did he have time to process it before he was off the ground and jumping onto the potato’s back like a flying squirrel. 

The anger; the resentment that had been building in his stomach was unleashed and the _beating_ Harry gives the potato is stopped only through the intervention of the teachers who are forced to grab Harry by the scruff and pick him up and away. 

The potato looks awful, he’s snivelling like a baby, weeping like a fool and tells the teachers this story of trying to stop Harry from hurting the “chink” and getting beaten up instead. 

Freddy doesn’t get much of a chance to refute that, she’s in pain but even then her half-mumbled, accented English is all but ignored by the teacher on monitoring duty who shushes her, doesn’t try to understand and sends Harry straight to the headmaster’s office.

The horse is called and Harry is suspended for two months and is taken straight back to his cupboard. 

The horse’s screeching, her nails and fists is nothing compared to when the walrus gets home from work early. The things the walrus does when Harry is taken up stairs, the pain is nothing. The pain Harry can get over, that wasn’t - that isn’t the -

The walrus starts with punching him with hard, solid hits that leave Harry breathless. The walrus’ feet stomp on Harry’s hands, his back, the backs of his legs. Harry hears something crack, isn’t sure where or what, can’t differentiate the hurt.

The walrus doesn’t leave Harry much time to try and breathe through it, to _move,_ before he is undoing his belt. The buckle strikes Harry’s bare back and bottom from where clothes had been ripped and shoved aside, it hits blossoming bruises and he can’t help from crying out when the metal tears into his skin.

Tears are running down his cheeks and he can’t stop them as pain bleeds into humiliation and fear as the walrus’ attack changes into something else entirely. They are the last tears he cries for a very long time.

* * *

The colours are gone now.

Everything is muted and ugly and Harry hates himself. Harry woke up in his cupboard a week ago and they haven’t really let him out for anything but for the walrus to take his anger out on Harry. 

The fire in his stomach feels cold, dead and the coals of Harry’s temper is gone. His apathy only makes the walrus try harder for some sort of reaction but Harry’s -

The walrus has already broken something.

* * *

When he finally returns to school, the whispers that follow Harry are loud and cruel. It also doesn’t take long for him to see that Freddy isn’t there anymore. The potato likes to taunt him that she left because of him but Harry knows from listening to the teachers, that her parents decided to move her after she had gotten hurt.

Harry tries not to think about Freddy when he sits down at the end table, in the end seat with no one next to him. He tries not to think about Freddy in break or lunch or when he gets to the house. He tries not think about the friendship bracelet curled around his ankle.

(He’s not very good at it.)

* * *

Harry is called back into the headmaster’s office on a Tuesday. The room is hot and stuffy and smells of burnt coffee, just like the last time. Unlike last time, Harry wants to leave.

The silence is uncomfortable as the headmaster stares at Harry unkindly, eyes dark and not really _seeing._ It was like the man wasn’t even looking at Harry at all.

He asks about the bruises but Harry has been through this before and it is easy for him to lie. It doesn’t really even matter anymore.

_I fell._

_I got into a fight._

_I walked into the street without looking both ways._

_I tripped down the stairs._

Even so, Harry explains it all away until they fit like truths into his mouth and leaves their bitter taste behind.

* * *

Then he turns eleven.

 

The day Harry got his Hogwarts letter is the day that he thinks everything will be different. He’s not entirely right but he’s not wrong either. Harry, will however, always resent the owl that carried his invite into another world. Or the number of owls, as was the case for Harry.

Harry will think back to the time of hide and seek the horse and the walrus played, with the potato who was confused and desperate for things to get back to normal. With the walrus and the man’s purple face and his white knuckled fists and then -

And then the horse who kept her eye on him like she was keeping him from leaving, like her sister turned out to have when she shared his age.

Harry might have had some sympathy if she hadn’t lied to him. If she hadn’t called their deaths a _car crash_ after a night of drinking with his father at the wheel.

Harry feels it when he looked at her then, in that dark, broken cabin with the potato sporting a pig’s tail and the walrus holding his pretzel of a short gun, that he will never forgive her. 

And as the horse stares back, an animal that should have been his aunt, he knows that she knows.

* * *

Harry is taken for his wand and after boxes and boxes he finds _the one._ It is warm in his hand, gentle and it sparks with _colour._ And Harry sees it, the colour, that smoothes over the cracks in his chest and makes things…ache less.

It is a wand like his mothers, a wand like his fathers and the echo of _great but terrible things,_ only add to the weight that single strip of wood adds to his pocket.

Harry thinks it’ll be alright to carry it.

* * *

Ice cream is sweet and cold and Harry tries not to devourer it but savour every mouthful. His mouth is salivating, singing with every bite and it is the nicest thing he has ever eaten. Harry is surprised that the caretaker bought it; that he shelled out for this even though he doesn’t have to. Harry doubts that it is part of the man’s job description to give kids ice cream.

Harry learns things from the caretaker too. He learns that his parents loved him - loved him enough to die for him. He learnt the name Voldemort and he learnt war, a war that was different from the Battle of Hastings because this was…personal.

* * *

The horse doesn’t look at him and that’s fine with Harry, he finds the red, hot gaze of the walrus far worse as he is dropped at the train station to find his own way;

He didn’t know what else he was expecting.

* * *

The redhead asks to see Harrys scar and the boy says it like it’s something wonderful. It’s like he doesn’t realise that the raw, splintering cicatrix was from the touch of the killer who had taken Harry’s parents; that it marked the attempt on Harry’s life and everything he lost that night.

Harry still lifts his fringe and watches with dead eyes as the redhead’s own light up. The redhead mentions how _cool_ it is and Harry almost says how much it still _hurts._

Harry doesn’t have much to say, had been taught silence by his relatives and so doesn't have anything to add as the redhead talks at him while not seeming to realise how little Harry was responding.

Not much later and a girl with frizzy hair and bucked teeth is entering with a boy just behind, asking after a toad that is quickly forgotten about after she recognises him. Harry is not expecting her to tell him she _knows everything about him_ and he resents that, a bit. Because the one thing he could understand about this world was how little its people _did_ know him.

He had become a story, with books written by authors he had never spoken to on adventures he had never taken.

The redhead and bucked teeth quickly start to bicker as the boy with tawny eyes, dark curls and a roundish figure watches on uncertainly.

* * *

Harry would have preferred the foretold troll. As it is, the Hat isn’t sure where to put him; it circles and ponders, humming and hawing and looks through Harry like no one ever has before. It is disconcerting and he hates that the Hat can see things people never should.

He wants this over and maybe because this was intrusive and _uninvited_ that Harry thinks _just put me where people want me._

Harry knows he’s famous now and this makes things loud, can feel the eyes burning through him, reads that people want things now, even if those “things” are just to shake his hand. He doesn’t like it but he wants this experience to have as little - crowding, as possible. 

The call of _Gryffindor_ is with a warning from the Hat that Harry will end up regretting this. Harry will end up regretting a lot of things and maybe being a Gryffindor would try and destroy him, but that was okay, many things had.

* * *

The billowing-robed, snake-faced potions professor hates Harry and he can’t figure out why. Then again, the twinkly-eyed, bearded headmaster likes him a _too_ much and Harry’s not sure which one bothers him most. The strict cat head-of-house is firm but fair and the deference teacher is…unsettling.

However, it’s still just another school. The one’s in green hate him, some in blue too, while the reds just talk of him, with the one's in yellow watching him.

The attitudes are annoying and the one with the toad - light eyes and dark hair - is really the only one who allows Harry even a fraction of peace.

But there’s magic and no relatives. The redhead and bucked teeth grow on him, even if it’s just through routine. They have their good qualities but Harry doesn’t know what to do with them.

* * *

Nothing changes; he goes to his classes, does homework, agrees to play magical chess while a “mystery” unravels itself. (An obviously _concocted_ mystery.) Harry was young; he didn’t understand this world very well yet but he wasn’t _stupid,_ his instincts were strong and the whole situation where a priceless, dangerous _rock_ was left at a school was either due to incompetence, insanity or something more complicated.

Either way, Harry was getting clues thrown at him left and right. It was like someone really wanted to _play_ and Harry, who was getting fed up and irritated was happy to oblige.

It’s when Harry sees the back of the defence professors head that he comprehends that this is more dangerous than he had initially given credence to.

Soon, he is standing in front of what is left of what had killed his parents.

 _I remember you,_ Harry thinks but doesn’t say because it wouldn’t _matter. I remember you - I remember and know how my mother begged for my life._

Harry isn’t sure what he is feeling when the thing _burns_ at his touch, because his emotional range is short and few but learning that he had killed the defence professor and by proxy that _thing_ doesn’t - doesn’t _bother_ Harry, not like it should.

* * *

The redhead and the bucked teeth knew what had happened when Harry was left to go on ahead of them and their reaction to the news, that Harry had killed defending himself and that stupid rock was strange. They had followed him down the rabbit hole though so Harry ignores it and tries to recover his strength.

He didn’t fully understand what had happened with the defence professor but whatever it was, had drained Harry. It left him boneless, without any sort of support. He’ll learn it’s magical strain and it eventually goes away, but the cold it started does not.

The announcement of why Hogwarts would require a new defence teacher happened while Harry was still in Pomfrey’s care and his treatment afterwards is decidedly different. The plump boy with the heart-shaped face who seemed forever forgetful, oddly seems affronted by this attitude and doesn’t shy away from making a statement at breakfast and dinner by sitting himself next to Harry, even though he otherwise never says anything.

But actions spoke louder than words and Harry never asked anyone to speak for him.

* * *

When the forgetful boy joins Harry with the redhead and bucked teeth in the compartment on the train, Harry’s…okay with that. Forgetful’s nervous as he walks in but not so much that he’s unable to sit up next to Harry’s side.

Forgetful is sort of scared of everything so Harry understand that it probably took a lot for someone like that to come uninvited into a compartment with people who was responsible for leaving him jinxed as stiff as a statue in their Common Room.

So, Harry answers when he is spoken to while the redhead and the bucked teeth argue about their summer arrangements. _What will you be doing back in the Muggle world?_ Forgetful asks and Harry honestly answers about the chores he’ll have to do, while the others leave for a week on holiday.

Forgetful jolts from where he had been petting his toad and turns to stare wide-eyed at Harry. There is understanding there, understanding that Harry observes from the way tawny eyes harden, and how Forgetful comments that his uncle - the one that had thrown him out of a window - would be coming to visit.

Harry allows it when Forgetful reaches out to squeeze one of Harry’s hands.

* * *

The horse and walrus are _not_ happy to see him, nor is the potato, but Harry probably would have died from shock if they had been. They sneer at him and snatch his trunk from his hands after having him take it to the front door. His belongings - the only things that he can truly call his - are locked into the cupboard. _No freakishness here, boy,_ is said on repeat like once isn’t enough as the walrus pulls him up the stairs and into the room with everything broken and abandoned.

He doesn’t wait for the door to shut and heads for the bed.

* * *

Harry doesn’t get any owls though the redhead and bucked teeth had promised to write. Harry hadn’t been expecting anything though, so it is a surprise when one morning he’s sorting through the mail and he spots an envelope with his name on it and _far_ too many stamps.

Harry never makes the same mistake twice and uncaring if it rips - the walrus would set it on _fire -_ he stuffs it into his pocket and takes the rest back to the breakfast table, for the walrus to look over from his mountain of greasy food.

He waits all day, through his chores and stomach grumbles until night has fallen and he is locked inside the bedroom again. Quietly, Harry opens the envelope under the blankets to muffle the ruffling of paper and pauses to hear any stomping feet.

When everything remains still and silent, Harry pulls it out to read in the light of the moon.

** “To,  **

** Harry James Potter, Lord Potter of the Potter House. **

** Hello, Harry (May I call you Harry? I ~~guess I’ve never asked but since we’re godbrothers I~~ ). Sorry for sending you another letter, ~~I suppose if you were ever going to answer you would have by now,~~ I just wanted to talk to you. **

** I haven’t tried sending mail the Muggle way before so I’m not sure if it’ll reach you and I don’t want to write too much. This might be unwelcome since I forgot to to ask on the train if it was alright with you ~~and I guess after so long without any response I shouldn’t bother you~~. **

** If you receive this and you want to talk then respond but it doesn’t matter if you don’t want to. Now that I’ve met you, I think I understand why you’ve been so quiet. **

 

** Neville Longbottom **

** Heir Longbottom of the Longbottom House**

** P.S. One the outside of this envelope is a PO box that you can return it to so you can send it the Muggle way. Grandmother wasn’t very amused when she had to set it up but she didn’t mind, since the Longbottom’s have been allied with the Potter’s for so long.” **

* * *

Meeting the house elf had certainly been an experience. It had put itself at risk for Harry, which had left him confused as to why the creature cared at all for Harry’s safety. It didn’t matter in the end, whatever the Wizarding World would do to him, it was better then sticking around here.

The creature didn’t understand Harry’s flippancy and that was fine, Harry didn’t understand its urgency.

* * *

Harry has just helped fly a car into a demented tree and is looking forward to getting some sleep when in the darkness, his bed curtain’s begin to shift and then _open._ Harry sleeps with his wand under his pillow and he’s not hesitant to use it.

The tip of his wand is glowing red and lights up Forgetful's face before either of them can take a second breath. Almost instantly, Forgetful is fumbling to get his hands up in the air in surrender. Harry narrows his eyes but lowers his weapon quickly enough and after a moment, moves over to allow Forgetful some space on the mattress. 

Harry had hidden forgetful’s letter under the floorboards with a collection of other things he had squirrelled away. He had attempted to write back with a crumbled piece of paper he had used for drawing, it had been dirty and dog-eared on side with an edge torn on the other but it would do.

Harry wrote with one of the potato’s old crayons he had snapped in a fit of anger and attempted to copy forgetful’s writing style, since Harry hadn’t been taught how to compose a letter but knew enough about English to understand there were ways to do it.

He had sent it off when he had passed a post box while he was doing the grocery shopping, having borrowed one of tens of stamps that forgetful had sent him. His response was mostly that of confusion and asking for an explanation once Harry had gotten back to school.

Harry was up most of the night listening to forgetful as he went into detail of Harry’s family; the Potters, their standing in the Wizarding World. Harry listened, he was good at that after all this time and couldn’t help but feel relief. His father had left property and money, Harry wasn’t trapped at the whims of the horse and the walrus, and because of some archaic law, muggles couldn’t inherit so they couldn’t steal it from him.

Forgetful hesitated after that, before awkwardly clearing up other parts of the letter that he had crossed out, but so lightly that Harry could still read and _understand._ Forgetful was his godbrother, had been sending him letters for years, trying to get some sort of response or just trying to quietly tell Harry that he still had some family left.

Harry hadn’t ever got the letters but forgetful hadn’t _known_ that, would have been left to be believe that Harry had been ignoring him and even after all that, here forgetful was to explain Harry’s family to him and offer to take him to Gringotts to sort things out with the goblins. Here he still was. 

That - meant things to Harry. It was…dedication that Harry hadn’t experienced before. Without his permission, Harry’s hand reached out to grasp hold of Neville’s. _Thank you._

* * *

The pony was showy, a man of no substance and every time he held Harry up to speak of his fame, well, Harry’s temper would burn and he would wish for nothing more than to hit the pony is glistening white teeth. He pranced and preened and got off on the infatuations of eleven-year-olds. Neville had to hold him back by the time Valentines Day was coming around.

The pony’s very presence made Harry’s skin itch and he really wanted to know how the headmaster chose his staff. It was starting to seem a bit suspect after his hiring of Voldemort’s host.

* * *

A pattern was emerging in Hogwarts when something want wrong: Harry was either expected to fix it or was blamed for it. Least, that’s what Harry was slowly coming to realise. It could be a small thing like someone tripping in his vicinity, but it was the larger problems that was starting to get under Harry’s skin like dirt getting trapped inside his nails after a long, weathered day in the horse’s garden.

The snake-faced professor was really responsible for whispering that spell into the ferret’s ear but Harry hadn’t realised that in all the magical world - with all that they can do - that they would fear a _language_ , one that Harry hadn’t fully known he could speak.

(Duelling had been a bad idea for Harry anyway. He was too wound-up, holding onto his temper by his fingertips now. Every confrontation made his body burn with adrenaline and his legs tingle with fight or flight instincts. Sometimes it felt like Harry was going to _implode_ through the force it took to hold himself back.)

Really, no one in a fight should hold still and _wait_ to get attacked anyway. What sort of garbage was this moron trying to teach them?

It was lucky for the ferret that he had gotten that spell off when he had, Harry had been seconds away from pouncing on the git. Which was something Harry just wouldn’t have been able to feel not long ago. Regardless of how this world treated him, it had…reignited the fire in his chest.

* * *

Neville explains when everyone else has gone to bed, asleep and obnoxiously snoring, _why_ speaking to snakes is such a bad thing. Or at least he tries, Neville doesn’t seem scared of Harry but he’s anxious as he lists reasons. Most of which centre around _because Voldemort could._

Neville doesn’t look at him any different though and doesn’t try to tell to him that it was evil (like the redhead), or say that he should talk to someone about it (like bucked teeth). Neville doesn’t shy away from Harry, doesn’t feel the need to create distance on Harry’s bed - in Harry’s territory - and instead smiles.

_N-nothings really changed,_ Neville says. _You could speak before and you still can._

Acceptance, Harry starts to understand, looks like the boy curled down beside him, with plump rosy cheeks, tawny eyes and dark floppy curls.

* * *

Someone is Petrified and mob mentality acts like it usually does and Harry is suddenly the _Heir of Slytherin: Slayer of Mudbloods._ It’s ridiculous. No one has a brain in the Wizarding World (sorry Neville). They ignore evidence like the time Harry had started a punch out (and boy, had that ferret been _out_ ) with the ferret after the punk had insulted Harry’s parents and his halfblood status. They don’t seem to remember that he keeps company with bucked teeth and has never once tried to push for a pureblood agenda.

None of what or who Harry is seems to matter. Harry can talk to snakes. Harry’s different so he’s _obviously_ “dark”. Well, Harry takes issue with that.

Pushing that sword through that snakes mouth is the least the snake deserves and it feels so _good_ for Harry to be able to let loose, to fight without having to worry about consequences.

The redhead’s sister survives and wakes up just in time to see Harry drying from the puncture in his arm. The snake’s tooth had gone straight through flesh and bone and muscle which would have hurt enough but it _burns._

The redhead’s sister cries for him but Harry can barely hear her over the rush of blood in his ears. The swirling dim of his sight panics him and the nausea clogs his throat as he struggles to breathe through the fire in his veins.

The black travelling up his arm from the stab wound was excruciating. It was almost like when the horse had pushed him into a deep fat fryer, and left him there to break down - it felt like Harry was getting _broken down -_  atom by atom, from the inside out, unravelled, destroyed. With a moment of clarity as the redhead’s sister runs to his side and tries to pick him up, to get him to _move,_ he’s glad Neville isn’t here to see this.

Then, a phoenix appears.

* * *

Harry lives and his arm heals with a scar more gruesome than whatever the walrus has ever done. Hopefully the horse never sees it, he didn’t want to hear anymore disgust from her. Neville, on the other hand -

Neville would not be pleased.

The brood of redhead’s are glad that the redhead’s sister is still breathing though they never really acknowledge what it took to keep her that way. _No good deed goes unpunished,_ the horse had muttered once after getting shortchanged and now Harry’s standing in a corner, watching a family reunion with a puckered, red welt the size of a philosopher’s stone on his forearm, a sword in the other, wishing for bed.

* * *

Neville is sitting so close to Harry on the train ride back that he is all but in Harry’s lap. Harry’s never keen on crowding; he needs space to gauge he’s safe but he doesn’t move.

Harry had left Neville behind, after all, gone out to kill that snake not alone but with only the redhead and the pony, when he knew he was going to face something of a monstrous size and strength. 

Harry had gotten back from the nurse’s care and flopped into bed, it wasn’t a second later before Neville had joined him with angry eyes and pursued lips. Harry had hurt him and yet, there wasn’t an ounce of  regret in him.

Harry was used to fighting, that was all he could do. Neville was better, kinder and shouldn’t be involved with stuff like that.

* * *

Harry goes back to the house. None of them are happy about, still, he hadn’t any intentions of blowing up the walrus’ sister until she said what she did, those - _words_ about his parents who had died protecting him. Who had loved him and wanted him and died doing a _good thing._

He didn’t care about his walrus’ beatings anymore as they had stopped hurting long ago (and there were worse things the man had done to him), but that also didn’t mean that he was going to allow it anymore, either. He’d already performed magic so what was a bit more?

Harry bursts out of the house, into the darkness, foreswearing them. He’s cold and alone and sitting on the edge of the pavement when a black dog the size of a _wolf_ approaches him.

The dog doesn't stay a dog for very long.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please excuse this chapter, I'm not...that happy with it. It's a base for the next one. That, and I needed to try and mix some of Hibari's characteristics into Harry before they become more obvious with what happens next chapter. Neville is also important for the story introducing him the way I have isn't random :).
> 
> Edit: Added some content that hopefully works better.

**Author's Note:**

> P.S. I know that Charlus Potter and Dorea Potter nee Black have confirmed not to be James' parents and that the Potter's were in fact - for some strange reason - not apart of the sacred twenty-eight, I just don't care. Fancy that for fanficiton hmm? XD


End file.
